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FOR    THE    CHILDREN'S    HOUR    yJERTES 

BROAD  STRIPES 
AND  BRIGHT  STARS 

Stories  of  American  History 


BY 

CAROLYN  SHERWIN  BAILEY 

Author  of 

For  the  Children's  Hour,"  "Firelight  Stories,"  •' Stories 

Children  Need/'    "For  the  Story  Teller, " 

"Tell  Me  Another  Story,'*  etc 


ILLUSTRATED  BY 

POWER  O'MALLEY 


MILTON  BRADLEY  COMPANY 

SPRINGFIELD,  MASSACHUSETTS 

19  19 


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Copyright  1919 

By  MILTON    BRADLEY    COMPANY 

Springfield,  Massachusetts 

All  Rights  Reserved 


€!0UCM;:riuH  r^t^B^. 


Bradlej?  Qialit}?  Boofes 

yl,r  Childten 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 


Pilgrims  for  Freedom 

Page 
.       11 

The  First  Fight 

24 

The  Freeman's  Charter       .... 

.      38 

Following  the  Beaver's  Trail     . 

50 

At  the  Gate  of  Old  Harvard 

64 

The  White  Man's  Foot        .... 

77 

Going  to  London  to  Visit  the  King    . 

.       82 

Ringing  in  the  Fourth  of  July   . 

97 

Keeping  Christmas  With  General  Washington 

.     106 

The  Ghost  That  Haunted  Wall  Street 

.     119 

The  Road  That  Went  Out  West 

.     131 

In  the  Wake  of  the  First  Steamboat. 

144 

Cutting  thiu  World's  Bread 

154 

When  Johnny  Bull  and  Brother  Jonathan  Shoop 
Hands     

164 

A  Slave  Among  Slaves          .... 

176 

One  Fl^ig,  or  Two? 

186 

Uncle  Remus  at  the  White  House 

198 

Uncle  Sam's  Birthday  Party        .         .         .         . 

210 

The  Ship  the  Giants  Launched    .         .         .         . 

219 

The  Town  Named  After  Him        .         .         .         . 

230 

The  Last  Fight             

231 

A  Proclamation 

241 

f»4  4.lAt 


EDITORIAL  NOTE: 

I  am  indebted  as  follows  for  copyrighted 
material  appearing  in  this  book:  To  the 
George  W.  Jacobs  Company  for  the  extract 
from  Historic  Inventions  by  Rupert  S.  Hol- 
land; to  Doubleday  Page  and  Company  for 
A  Slave  Among  Slaves  from  Up  From  Slavery 
by  Booker  T.  Washington.  The  White  Man's 
Foot  is  used  by  permission  of  and  special 
arrangement  with  Houghton  Mifflin  Com- 
pany. Mrs.  Mary  Stuart  Cutting  has  given 
permission  to  republish  in  this  connection  her 
poem  The  Town  Called  After  Him. 


PREFACE 

I  have  written  this  book  because  I  beheve 
that  the  story  of  the  American  people  as  it  is 
embodied  in  the  history  of  our  United  States 
suppUes  the  most  important  material  for 
character  building  in  the  entire  field  of 
elementary  education,  and  should  be  offered 
to  children  in  a  new,  humanitarian  way  as  a 
means  of  helping  them  to  understand  the 
present. 

The  plan  of  the  book  is  to  present  the 
development  of  our  nation,  not  as  a  summary 
of  unrelated  facts  and  a  confusion  of  dates, 
but  as  one  of  the  most  vivid  panoramas  the 
world  has  ever  known,  its  first  scene  laid 
on  Plymouth  Rock  and  its  last  the  flight  of  an 
American  aviator  winging  his  way  over  a 
battlefield  in  Europe.  The  historical  episodes 
that  make  this  panorama  are  selected  and  pre- 
sented in  such  a  way  as  to  show  boys  and  girls 
that  our  present  position  as  a  great  people 


is  the  result  of  following  the  road  of  freedom 
we  have  been  building  steadily  ever  since  the 
landing  of  the  Pilgrims,  and  that  real  de- 
mocracy can  be  really  efficient,  not  only  in 
the  case  of  our  own  nation,  but  in  our  relations 
to  the  other  peoples  of  the  world. 

My  method  of  presenting  these  historical 
epochs  is  different  from  the  average  story  in 
American  history  in  that  it  makes  a  direct 
appeal  to  conduct  and  to  life. 

Each  story  has  a  central  character  from 
history  as  its  hero  who  played  a  part,  begin- 
ning often  with  youth,  in  our  development  as  a 
free  country.  The  children  who  read  the 
stories  will  feel  and  understand  our  history 
as  the  men  who  made  it  did.  Through  this 
appeal  to  the  imagination,  boys  and  girls  of 
today  are  inspired  to  follow  lines  of  right 
conduct  and  to  achieve  as  our  ancestors  did. 
They  are  helped  to  understand  the  drama  of 
present  national  events  in  terms  of  our  valiant 
historical  past.  They  feel  an  urge  to  be, 
themselves,  a  part  of  our  history  tomorrow. 

The  stories  embody  only  those  fundamental 
facts  and  dates  which  have  a  direct  bearing 
upon  our  present  position  as  a  great,  free. 


nation,  and  some  of  these  facts  include  the 
stories  of  far-seeing  inventors  whose  mechani- 
cal achievements  not  only  bettered  our  own 
industrial  organization,  but  strengthened  our 
bonds  with  the  outside  world.  Each  story 
emphasizes  the  social  and  ethical  features  of 
the  period  it  represents;  home  life,  schooling, 
food,  agriculture,  travel,  transportation,  typi- 
cal customs,  business,  discovery,  everyday 
work,  longing  for  expansion,  and  self  sacrifice 
are  used  to  create  an  atmosphere  of  reality 
about  each  story,  and  to  make  it  a  record  of 
men,  rather  than  of  names,  battles,  and 
statistics. 

Quite  as  important  as  this  social  appeal  is 
the  appeal  that  the  book  makes  to  children's 
powers  of  reasoning  and  judgment.  By  its 
very  definition,  history  is  a  study  in  cause  and 
effect;  because  some  individual  or  group 
dared  something  the  inevitable  happened. 
So  the  Pilgrims  dreamed  of  and  won  their 
fight  for  opportunity  in  the  New  World.  A 
bit  of  parchment  that  Governor  Winthrop 
refused  to  give  up  began  our  government  by 
the  people.  A  New  Amsterdam  trapper 
following  a  beaver's  trail  along  the  Hudson 


marked  our  first  business  street.  A  king  of 
the  House  of  Hanover  discovered  the  stuff 
of  which  the  English  people  were  made  when 
he  had  to  recognize  our  Independence.  An 
American  boy  experimenting  with  a  paddle 
wheel  and  fishing  boat  gave  the  steamboat  to 
commerce  and  travel,  and  a  wilderness  road 
opened  for  us  the  development  and  wealth  of 
the  west.  They  were  all  adventures  and 
combine  to  interpret  for  children  the  recent 
great  adventure  of  the  American  people,  the 
finding  of  a  new  democracy  for  ourselves,  no 
longer  cut  off  from  the  world,  but  one  with  the 
nations  of  the  Old  World  in  kindness  and  co- 
operation, pity,  unselfishness,  help,  and  love 
of  noble  things. 

Carolyn  Sberwin  Bailey. 


Broad  Stripes 
and  Bright  Stars 


BROAD  STRIPES 
AND  BRIGHT  STARS 


PILGRIMS  FOR  FREEDOM 

From  the  time  when  he  was  a  boy  on  his 
father's  great  country  estate  in  the  north  of 
England,  Miles  Standish  had  been  thrilled 
by  the  stories  he  had  heard  of  the  New  World, 
lying  across  the  Atlantic  Ocean  from  Britain. 
They  were  adventurous  enough  tales  to  thrill 
any  boy,  especially  one  with  a  high  spirit  and 
great  courage  pent  up  in  a  very  smaU  body. 
'^Miles  in  name,  but  inches  in  stature, ''  was 
what  they  said  of  him. 

On  the  yellowing  charts  in  his  father's 
library  Miles  could  have  pointed  out,  the 
voyage  across  the  Atlantic  of  the  Great  Sea- 
man, as  English  seafaring  folk  still  called 
Sebastian  Cabot,  who  had  touched  the  main- 
land of  the  New  World  almost  a  century 
before. 

*^Here  he  started,''  Miles  would  say,  in- 
dicating an  EngUsh  port  on  the  map.  ^Then 
he  sailed  due  north,  toward  the  land  whose 


12 PILGRIMS  FOR  FREEDOM 

islands  Christopher  Columbus  discovered. 
He  loved  the  sea  more  than  anything  else, 
and  he  braved  fog  and  chilling  winds  and  huge 
icebergs  on  this  perilous  voyage.  Three 
months  the  Great  Seaman  was  gone,  and 
when  he  returned  he  brought  tales  of  having 
touched  the  shores  of  a  cold,  bleak  country 
with  fields  of  ice  and  snow.  Until  he  died 
Sebastian  Cabot  talked  of  the  New  World 
that  he,  sailing  for  England,  had  touched. 
I  would  have  liked  to  take  passage  with  him," 
Miles  would  finish. 

An  old  serving  man  on  the  Standish  estate 
was  able  to  tell  Miles  a  story  of  one  Christmas 
over  three  score  years  before  in  the  New 
World. 

'^England  is  fair  and  full  of  plenty,"  he 
he  would  say,  ^'but  Cortes,  the  Spanish 
discoverer,  found  a  fairer  land.  Fancy  a  city, 
lad,  built  of  gold  and  silver  and  set  on  a  wide 
blue  lake  with  floating  gardens  on  its  waters! 
There  were  palaces  in  this  southern  kingdom 
in  which  dark  skinned  Aztec  rulers  lived  who 
owned  mines  of  precious  stones  and  rich 


PILGRIMS  FOR  FREEDOM 13 

harvest  fields,  and  were  envied  by  other 
nations.'^ 

'Then,  near  Christmas  in  the  year  1520?^^ 
Miles  would  ask. 

'The  ambitious  Spaniard,  Hernando  Cortes, 
reached  this  Aztec  city  and  marched  through 
its  streets  with  a  band  of  soldiers,''  the  old 
man  continued.  'The  Aztecs  had  a  tradition 
that,  years  before,  they  had  been  visited  by  a 
stranger  from  the  East  who  had  taught  them 
all  the  arts  of  peace  and  war  and  had  said 
that  he  would  come  again  to  demand  the 
whole  of  their  kingdom.  They  thought  that 
Cortes  was  this  conqueror." 

"And  so  the  Spaniard  found  the  southern 
part  of  the  New  World,''  Miles  would  end  the 
story  as  he  looked  wistfully  across  the  quiet 
English  pastures  in  the  direction  of  the  sea, 
and  this  land  of  wonders. 

It  was  the  reign  of  Queen  Elizabeth  in 
England,  a  time  of  merry  feasting  and  tourna- 
ments, of  pageants  and  velvet  cloaks  and 
jewels  and  fine  lace.  There  was  every  chance 
for  Miles  Standish,  grown  to  a  youth,  to  sit 
at  the  feet  of  the  Queen  and  obtain  favor  at 


14 PILGRIMS  FOR  FREEDOM 

the  Elizabethan  court,  being  well  born  and  of 
a  fiery,  spirited  kind  of  courage.  But  the 
walls  of  a  palace  seemed  to  him  as  limited  as 
prison  walls,  and  the  shores  of  England  were 
too  narrow  for  him.  He  wanted  a  chance  to 
voyage  away  from  them  as  the  Great  Seaman 
had  done  so  many  years  before.  Suddenly 
his  chance  came.  Spanish  pirates  attempted 
to  take  the  Belgian  coast  town  of  Ostend,  and 
the  Hollanders  made  a  stand  to  hold  it  against 
them.  Queen  Elizabeth  decided  to  send 
troops  to  Flanders  to  help  the  Dutch. 

Miles  Standish  remembered  the  story  that 
had  seemed  so  wonderful  to  him  in  his  boy- 
hood. Again  he  saw  the  conquering  Spanish 
explorer  marching  on  the  feast  day  of  peace 
to  wrest  their  kingdom  from  the  Aztecs  in  the 
New  World.  Here,  at  a  port  of  the  Old  World, 
was  an  expedition  of  the  same  ambitious 
Spaniards.  Miles  Standish  went  to  the  Queen 
with  a  request  for  service. 

^'You  would  be  a  minstrel,  a  squire,  a 
jester?"  the  Queen  asked,  looking  down  at 
the  earnest  youth.  No  wonder  she  asked  it; 
only  a  scant  five  feet  tall,  a  round  face  like  a 


PILGRIMS  FOR  FREEDOM 15 

boy's  but  with  large,  dark  blue  eyes  that 
flashed  temper  and  strong  determination  and 
high  courage  like  darts  of  lightning,  that  was 
Miles  Standish.  His  answer  proved  his 
worth. 

"I  would  like  a  sword,  your  Majesty." 

A  lieutenant  at  eighteen;  that  was  a  good 
beginning!  Miles  Standish  went  to  Flanders 
and  fought  like  the  intrepid  soldier  he  was  for 
three  years  in  the  long  siege  of  Ostend.  The 
town  surrendered  at  last  and  a  truce  was 
declared.  Miles  Standish  was  now  a  captain 
and  engaged  in  garrison  duty,  first  in  one  post 
and  then  in  another,  until  he  was  sent  at  last 
to  Leyden  in  Holland. 

Here,  away  from  his  native  England,  Miles 
Standish  heard  again  tales  and  rumors  of  the 
New  World.  The  Hollanders  had  an  odd 
geographical  theory  about  it. 

"That  continent  on  the  other  side  of  the 
Atlantic  is  only  a  narrow  strip  of  land,"  they 
said.  "It  is  quite  possible  that  there  is  a 
strait  which  leads  through  it." 

It  was  a  good  guess,  for  no  one  really  knew. 

"If  we  could  sail  north  of  or  through  this 


16 PILGRIMS  FOR  FREEDOM 

strange  land,"  the  Dutch  East  India  trading 
company  said,  '^how  it  would  shorten  our 
route!"  And  with  this  idea  in  mind  they  had 
sent  Henry  Hudson  on  a  voyage  in  1609  to 
try  and  discover  a  quicker  route  to  India. 
Miles  Standish  listened  to  the  reports  of  Henry 
Hudson's  trip.  It  was  almost  as  exciting  as 
Cabot's  voyage  had  been. 

Henry  Hudson  had  sailed  in  the  little  Half 
Moon,  a  cold  and  stormy  western  voyage. 
His  crew  was  close  to  mutiny,  and  he,  himself, 
grew  discouraged  and  heartsick.  He  en- 
countered icebergs  and  chilling  currents  to- 
ward the  north  so  he  changed  his  course  south. 
When  the  Half  Moon,  battered  and  with  torn 
sails,  was  about  to  turn  back,  she  had  drifted 
quietly  into  a  beautiful  river.  Wild  roses 
grew  so  low  on  the  shores  that  the  tired 
seamen  could  pick  them,  and  there  were 
purple  grapes  and  rosy  apples  and  plenty  of 
fish.  On  either  side  of  this  river,  which  they 
named  the  Hudson,  were  great  green  hills. 

Close  on  these  tales  came  others  of  an 
English  settlement  in  the  New  World  estab- 
lished by  King  James  the  First,  who  ruled 


PILGRIMS  FOR  FREEDOM  17 

England  now  in  place  of  Queen  Elizabeth.  It 
was  called  Virginia,  because  the  country  was 
so  new  and  so  fair.  The  colonists  were  having 
struggles  with  wild  savages,  it  was  reported, 
but  they  had  found  food  and  raw  materials 
unknown  in  their  home  country,  and  valuable; 
potatoes  and  wild  turkeys,  sassafras  root, 
tobacco,  great  cedar  posts  and  walnut  timber, 
and  iron  ore. 

It  was  all  a  part  of  dreams,  and  yet  true. 

Holland  was  a  tidy,  comfortable  place  in 
which  to  live.  Captain  Standish,  when  he  was 
not  on  duty,  walked  up  and  down  Leyden^s 
clean,  paved  streets,  saw  the  gardens  bright 
with  tulips  and  watched  the  trim  housewives 
in  their  bright  gowns  and  wooden  shoes  gos- 
siping across  one  carved  half  door  to  another. 
All  that  the  little  kingdom  of  Holland  asked 
was  a  chance  to  tend  her  gardens  and  keep 
house  in  the  clean,  bright  way  in  which  she 
had  always  done. 

But  one  day  Miles  Standish  noticed 
strangers  in  Leyden.  A  stern,  sober  English- 
man in  a  long  black  cloak  and  tall  hat  hurried 
by.    With  him  was  a  young  girl,  who  might 


18 PILGRIMS  FOR  FREEDOM 

have  been  his  daughter,  her  fair  curls  tucked 
smoothly  into  a  tight  muslin  cap  and  a  muslin 
kerchief  folded  demurely  over  the  shoulders 
of  her  straight  gray  frock. 

^Tilgrims/'  a  friend  told  Captain  Standish 
later.  ^^Leyden  is  full  of  them.  They  left 
England  because  they  want  to  be  free  to 
build  their  own  church.  They  will  not  be  held 
by  the  laws  of  the  Church  of  England.  Now 
they  find  that  they  are  not  free  in  Holland, 
either.  They  are  restless  and  chafe  under 
the  peace  and  quiet  here.  Their  children 
are  growing  up  to  speak  the  Dutch  tongue  and 
to  forget  English  customs.  These  Pilgrims 
are  rightly  named.  Captain;  they  have  no 
abiding  place.  They  are  planning  even," 
the  man  lowered  his  voice  at  the  hazard  of  the 
scheme,  ^'to  make  a  voyage  to  the  New 
World!" 

Captain  Standish  listened  and  then  made 
a  sudden  decision.  Here  was  a  great  op- 
portunity for  him  and  for  England,  he 
believed.  The  spirit  of  all  the  valiant  ex- 
plorers who  had  gone  before  suddenly  filled 
his   heart.     He   fancied   himself   the   Great 


PILGRIMS  FOR  FREEDOM 19 

Seaman,  bailing  an  uncharted  ocean  to  find 
a  new  land.  He  was  the  soldier  who  would 
wrest  that  fair  Aztec  kingdom  from  the 
oppression  of  Spain.  He  saw  the  green  hills 
that  bordered  the  Hudson  River,  and  he 
could  feel  and  touch  the  fruits  and  crops  of 
Virginia.  Here,  in  Leyden,  were  his  followers, 
English  folk  like  himself,  and  bound  on  the 
same  pilgrimage  as  that  of  which  he  had 
dreamed. 

^'I  will  lead  the  Pilgrims  to  the  New  World," 
he  said. 

'^But  you  are  not  of  their  belief;  you  are  of 
the  Church  of  England, '^  his  friend  protested. 

^That  makes  no  difference  at  all,"  Miles 
Standish  said.  ^They  are  pilgrims  for  free- 
dom. This  matter  of  building  a  church  is  the 
way  the  dream  came  to  them." 

And  this  proved  to  be  true,  for  the  Pilgrims 
accepted  the  leadership  of  Captain  Miles 
Standish.  They  put  themselves  under  his 
guidance  for  the  perilous  adventure  upon 
which  they  at  once  embarked. 

An  ocean  liner  of  today  slips  away  from  her 
dock  with  scarcely  a  throb  of  her  engines.    One 


20  PILGRIMS  FOR  FREEDOM 

lives  aboard  her  for  the  days  of  the  trip  across 
the  Atlantic  Ocean  much  as  one  lives  in  a 
hotel  in  a  great  city;  there  are  the  same 
comfortable  beds  and  baths,  a  great  dining 
room,  a  library,  musicians,  and  servants. 
One  scarcely  feels  the  waves,  and  a  storm  is 
safely  weathered. 

There  were  no  ocean  liners  in  the  seven- 
teenth century.  Miles  Standish  and  the 
Pilgrims  boarded  a  small  sailing  vessel,  the 
Speedwell,  and  crossed  to  England  where  they 
were  joined  by  another  sailing  vessel,  only 
slightly  larger,  the  Mayflower.  She  was 
crowded  with  other  wayfarers  who  wanted  to 
begin  living  anew  in  a  new  land.  It  was  in 
August  of  the  year  1620  that  the  two  little 
ships  started  on  their  three  thousand  mile 
trip. 

They  had  gone  out  a  short  distance  only 
when  water  began  to  pour  into  the  hold  of  the 
Speedwell  and  she  barely  returned  to  port 
without  sinking.  They  stopped  the  leak  and 
set  sail  again,  but  three  hundred  miles  from 
land  the  vessel  began  to  take  water  again. 
Then  Captain  Standish  discovered  that  the 


PILGRIMS  FOR  FREEDOM 21 

Speedwell's  captain  was  a  coward,  afraid  to 
go  on  with  the  hazardous  voyage,  and  he  had 
disabled  the  ship.  The  Pilgrims  abandoned 
the  Speedwell  and  crowded  into  the  May- 
flower. There  were  over  a  hundred  men, 
women  and  children.  She  was  loaded  with 
guns,  and  tools  for  farming  and  building, 
kettles,  spinning  wheels,  crude  furniture  and 
kitchen  utensils,  only  the  needful  things  for 
beginning  a  new  life,  but  they  freighted  the 
little  bark  so  heavily  that  her  deck  almost 
touched  the  level  of  the  sea.  There  was  no 
refuge  from  storms  as  the  sea  washed  over  the 
deck,  and  the  wind  bent  the  frail  masts  and 
tossed  the  Mayflower  like  a  boat  sailed  by  a 
child  in  play. 

Stout  hearts  and  brave  hands  filled  the 
Mayflower,  though.  The  men  bailed  out  the 
leaking  holds  and  mended  broken  spars  and 
never  once  gave  up  the  ship  for  lost,  even 
when  she  was  blown  about  like  a  chip  in  the 
waters  of  a  strange  ocean.  The  women  would 
have  scorned  to  speak  of  their  fears  and  the 
children  did  not  murmur.  Miles  Standish  was 
pilot  and  comforter  and  captain  of  hope  all  in 


22  PILGRIMS  FOR  FREEDOM 

one.  He  seemed  a  giant  in  stature,  so  great 
was  his  courage.  Each  one  of  the  cold,  bleak 
days  of  the  two  months  that  the  Mayflower 
took  her  trackless  way  to  the  New  World, 
Captain  Standish  had  the  same  message  of 
cheer  for  the  Pilgrims. 

^'We  are  one  day  nearer  our  port.  Some 
morning  we  will  see  the  plentiful  fields  of 
Virginia." 

But  when  land  was  first  sighted  from  the 
Mayflower  in  November  of  the  same  year, 
1620,  it  was  a  bleak,  rocky  coast.  Bare  oak 
trees  and  pointed  pines  made  impenetrable 
forests.  There  was  nothing  growing;  there 
were  no  shelters  waiting  for  the  Pilgrims, 
and  it  was  almost  winter.  They  had  drifted 
in  a  northerly  direction  and  had  sighted 
the  point  of  land   that  is  now    Cape    Cod. 

Captain  Standish  and  a  few  men  made  a 
diflnicult  landing  and  cut  trails  through  the 
woods  to  try  and  locate  a  spot  for  a  settle- 
ment. Sometimes  they  lost  their  way  in  the 
forests;  very  often  an  arrow,  shot  from  an 
Indian's  bow,  would  whiz  past  them.  At  last, 
late  in  December,  they  found  a  little  open  bay 


PILGRIMS  FOR  FREEDOM  23 

beyond  which  lay  wooded  hills  and  streams. 
It  showed  traces  of  English  explorers  and 
Captain  John  Smith,  in  charge  of  an  English 
expedition  to  Virginia,  had  marked  it  Ply- 
mouth. 

Wading  through  icy  water,  carrying  their 
children  and  their  few  utensils  through  the 
surf,  the  Pilgrims  landed  at  Plymouth  on 
December  21st,  1620.  They  stood  with  Miles 
Standish,  a  gallant  little  group,  their  feet  on  a 
bare  rock,  but  their  eyes  fixed  on  the  stars. 
The  New  World,  America,  was  very  different 
from  the  fair  land  of  which  they  had  dreamed, 
but  it  held  everything  for  which  they  had 
dared  the  voyage,  a  chance  to  start  at  the 
very  beginning  of  things,  and  to  start  free. 


THE  FIRST  FIGHT 

The  Indian,  Squanto,  crept  with  silent  foot- 
steps through  the  wintry  woods  of  Plymouth 
and  peered  in  the  window  of  the  log  building 
at  the  foot  of  the  hill.  News  of  the  arrival  of 
the  Pilgrims  with  their  fearless  captain,  Miles 
Standish,  had  been  brought  to  the  nearby 
tribe  by  Indian  scouts.  The  tribe  had 
watched  their  landing,  the  cutting  of  logs  for 
this  single  large  house  that  sheltered  the 
Pilgrims  and  their  tools  and  stores,  the  placing 
of  cannon  on  the  hilltop  and  the  enclosing  of 
the  settlement  by  a  tall  stockade.  They  had 
seen  the  women  washing  the  clothes  in  the 
water  of  some  chilly  stream,  they  had  watched 
this  doughty  leader  of  the  pale  faces.  Captain 
Standish,  helping  to  make  soup  in  a  large  iron 
pot,  tending  the  sick,  and  even  digging  graves 
during  those  first  hard  months  in  the  New 
World.    Whatever  came  to  his  hand,  he  did  as 


THE  FIRST  FIGHT 25 

well  as  he  had  fought  in  Flanders  and  guided 
the  Pilgrims  to  the  shores  of  Plymouth. 

It  was  so  with  the  others  of  this  little  com- 
pany of  strangers  in  the  redman's  land. 
Although  an  occasional  glimpse  of  a  painted 
face  looking  over  the  stockade,  a  swift  dart 
shot  from  an  Indian  bow  in  the  forest,  or  the 
echo  of  a  savage  yell  terrified  them,  they  went 
on  hunting  and  staking  off  plots  for  gardens 
and  houses,  and  cutting  logs  and  stalking 
game  in  a  fearless  way  that  interested  the 
tribes.  The  Indians  were  as  much  a  part  of 
America  as  were  the  pine  trees  and  the  deer. 
It  was  their  land  on  which  the  Pilgrims  were 
settling  and  the  savages  could  have  sur- 
rounded them  and  killed  them  at  any  time 
that  they  chose.  Instead,  they  were  watching 
their  new  neighbors  and  waiting. 

As  he  knelt,  unseen,  by  the  window  the 
Indian  runner  touched  the  rough  logs  of 
which  this  first  house  in  Plymouth  was  built. 
The  wigwam  to  which  he  would  return  was 
constructed  of  several  long  saplings,  stuck  in 
the  ground  in  a  circle  and  covered  over  with 
thickly  braided  rush  mats.    A  round  hole  at 


26 THE  FIRST  FIGHT 

the  top  made  the  chimney  and  another  hole 
at  the  bottom  was  the  door.  It  was  a  satis- 
factory enough  shelter  but  not  nearly  so  well 
built  and  lasting  as  the  one  beneath  whose 
wall  Squanto  was  crouching.  The  crevices 
between  the  logs  were  plastered  with  clay 
mortar.  The  roof  was  strongly  thatched.  The 
large  chimney  was  made  of  stout  sticks  laid 
crosswise,  one  upon  another,  and  well 
plastered  with  clay  inside  and  out.  These 
strangers  had  greater  skill,  different  tools  and 
more  deadly  weapons  than  their  Indian 
neighbors,  Squanto  realized,  but  the  scene 
inside  the  cabin  was  what  amazed  the  Indian. 
The  diminished  group  of  men  and  women 
and  children  huddled  about  a  small  fire.  Their 
number  was  less  than  half  of  those  who  had 
landed  with  such  hope  from  the  Mayflower  at 
the  beginning  of  the  winter  of  1620.  They 
had  pinched,  white  faces.  Remembering  his 
own  lodge  hung  with  dried  venison  and  fish, 
and  stored  with  grains  and  dried  berries  in 
preparation  for  this  long,  white  winter,  the 
Indian  understood  the  significance  of  what  he 
saw.    The  Pilgrims  were  about  to  lose  their 


THE  FIRST  FIGHT 


fight  with  hunger.  In  spite  of  their  bold 
courage  and  the  different  skill  with  which 
they  used  their  hands,  the  pale  faces  were 
conquered — unless. 

Squanto  rose  noiselessly.  He  hurried  away 
through  the  forest  as  quietly  as  a  red  leaf 
drifts,  blown  by  the  wind.  He  traveled  very 
swiftly,  for  he  was  bearing  news  to  his  tribe 
and  he  did  not  stop  until  he  saw  the  smoke 
rising  from  wigwams  and  was  met  by  other 
runners  who  conducted  him  to  the  lodge  of 
his  great  chief,  Massasoit.  Gathered  about 
a  council  fire  the  tribe  and  their  chief  discussed 
the  matter  of  the  settlement  at  Plymouth,  the 
glow  of  the  flames  lighting  their  painted  faces 
and  glistening  war  axes.  Should  they  kill 
or  make  friends  with  these  white  strangers? 
At  last  Massasoit  rose  and  led  the  way  to  a 
mound  of  earth  just  outside  the  limits  of  the 
camp.  There  were  many  of  these  mounds, 
some  of  them  holding  implements  of  warfare, 
another  concealing  a  collection  of  tools  that 
they  had  stolen  from  the  Pilgrims  but  did  not 
know  how  to  use.  These  were  Indian  treasure 
mounds.    Massasoit  solemnly  opened  one  and 


28 THE  FIRST  FIGHT 

lifted  out  some  heavy  baskets  filled  with  small 
kernels  of  grain,  yellow,  and  red  and  black. 
He  took  a  few  in  his  hand  and  fingered  them 
as  if  they  were  gold  coins.  They  were  indeed 
more  precious  than  money,  for  they  were 
kernels  of  Indian  corn  and  each  one  held  in  its 
heart  the  power  to  win  the  battle  the  Pilgrims 
were  fighting  against  starvation.  Massasoit 
lifted  out  a  basket  of  corn  and  returned  with 
it  to  his  lodge.  He  had  made  his  decision  in 
regard  to  his  pale  face  neighbors. 

March,  chill  and  blustering,  found  the 
Pilgrims  in  desperate  circumstances.  There 
were  a  few  log  houses  in  Plymouth  with  land 
for  gardens  laid  out  for  the  largest  families. 
Each  head  of  a  family  built  his  own  house, 
since  by  this  plan  every  one  did  his  best. 
But  the  food  supplies  they  had  brought  in  the 
Mayflower  were  exhausted;  they  were  in  too 
great  danger  from  unfriendly  Indians  now  to 
go  for  long  hunting  expeditions,  and  they  did 
not  understand  the  agricultural  conditions  of 
North  America  or  how  to  get  the  most  in  the 
way  of  crops  out  of  the  land.    Even  dauntless 


THE  FIRST  FIGHT  29 

Miles  Standish  had  almost  lost  heart;  it 
seemed  an  uneven  fight. 

We  think  of  the  settlers  of  Plymouth  in 
these  early  days  as  the  pictures  show  them  to 
us,  dressed  in  the  black  cloaks  and  stiffly 
starched  linen  and  buckle  trimmed  shoes  they 
had  worn  in  England.  But  the  spring  of  1621 
saw  them  a  ragged,  unkempt,  starved  colony  of 
nomad  English  folk  whose  sole  wealth  was 
their  courage  and  the  strong  belief  that  out 
of  their  desire  for  freedom  would  come  their 
power  to  attain  food  and  shelter  and  clothing. 

Then,  in  the  same  month  of  March,  the 
Pilgrims  were  startled  one  day  by  an  un- 
expected vision. 

Two  Indian  runners,  Squanto  and  his 
friend,  Samoset,  appeared  in  their  midst. 
Copper  skinned,  half  naked,  straight  as 
arrows,  these  two,  who  were  able  to  speak  a 
little  English,  explained  that  the  mighty  chief 
of  the  Iroquois  tribe,  Massasoit  himself,  was 
on  his  way  with  a  company  of  warriors  to  pay 
the  white  men  a  visit.  Before  the  Pilgrims 
had  time  to  take  council  together  as  to  what 
they  should  do  in  this  new  emergency,  Massa- 


30 THE  FIRST  FIGHT 

soit  was  seen  with  his  train  ascending  the  hill 
back  of  Plymouth.  On  the  brow  they  stopped, 
waiting  for  a  hostage.  They  had  made  them- 
selves ready  for  the  visit  with  great  care; 
their  faces  were  painted  across  with  wide 
streaks  of  black  and  white  or  black  and  red, 
and  some  had  braided  foxes'  tails  into  their 
long,  snake  like  hair.  Each  Indian  was  fully 
armed  with  bow  and  arrows  and  battle  axe. 

The  giving  and  taking  of  hostages  was  an 
old  custom  of  the  nations,  the  Pilgrims 
realized,  and  Edward  Winslow,  a  Pilgrim 
leader,  was  chosen  to  go  up  the  hill  to  Massa- 
soit,  wearing  his  polished  armor  and  sword 
and  carrying  some  knives  and  a  copper  chain 
as  gifts.  Winslow's  courage  was  great,  for 
Massasoit's  train  numbered  scores  of  picked 
warriors,  but  as  he  stood  before  them  fear- 
lessly the  Indians  stacked  their  weapons  and 
followed  him  down  the  hill  into  Plymouth. 

Captain  Standish  and  his  men  met  the 
company  and  fired  a  salute.  Miles  Standish 
had  never  forgotten  for  a  moment  the  story 
he  had  heard  in  his  boyhood  of  Cortes'  treat- 
ment of  the  Aztecs.    He  had  heard  tales,  also. 


THE  FIRST  FIGHT 31 

of  the  trouble  the  Enghsh  colonists  were 
having  now  in  Virginia  with  the  Indians; 
there  was  continual  warfare  and  slight  basis 
for  permanent  friendship  between  the  settlers 
of  Jamestown  and  their  red-skin  neighbors. 
He  had  faith  in  fair  dealing  and  neighborliness 
in  the  relation  between  the  two  races,  at  least 
until  the  Indians  showed  signs  of  direct 
hostility.  Here  were  red  men,  come  on  a 
friendly  visit  to  Plymouth,  so  the  military 
salute  was  given  to  welcome  them  and  then 
Massasoit  and  his  warriors  were  conducted 
to  the  central  house  in  the  village  of  Plymouth 
and  invited  to  seat  themselves  on  cushions 
as  a  feast  prepared  from  the  scanty  food 
stores  was  offered  them. 

Then  followed  the  framing  of  the  first 
treaty  between  the  white  men  and  the  red. 
Those  of  the  Indians  who  could  speak  English 
learned  it  by  heart  and  interpreted  and  taught 
it  to  the  others.  It  was  an  excellent  peace 
compact  for  civilized  and  savage  nations. 

The  Pilgrims  and  the  Indians,  to  begin  with, 
agreed  to  do  each  other  no  hurt.    But  if  an 


32  THE  FIRST  FIGHT 


Indian  should  hurt  a  white  man,  he  was  to  be 
referred  to  the  EngHsh  for  trial.  If  an  Indian 
should  rob  the  English,  or  an  Englishman  an 
Indian,  each  one  agreed  to  see  that  the  prop- 
erty was  returned  to  the  owner.  Each 
promised  to  be  the  other's  ally  in  case  of  war 
and  that  they  would  visit  each  other  unarmed. 
Massasoit  agreed  to  send  runners  with  the 
words  of  the  treaty  to  all  his  neighboring 
tribes.  The  great  chief  rose  to  leave,  as  mas- 
sive and  powerful  as  some  forest  oak  arrayed 
in  its  fall  colors  of  red  and  brown.  His  war- 
riors followed  him,  for  their  business  was  over, 
and  they  knew  that  their  chief  would  never 
break  his  word  as  long  as  he  lived. 

The  great  day  of  the  first  treaty  making 
in  Plymouth  was  not  quite  finished,  though. 
As  Massasoit  and  his  train  of  warriors  went 
back  over  the  hill,  Squanto  lingered  in  the 
stockade.  He  took  a  basket  from  under  his 
cloak  of  deer  skin  and  showed  it  to  the  wonder- 
ing Pilgrims.  It  was  full  of  those  same  strange 
seeds,  yellow  and  red  and  black.  He  offered 
it  to  Captain  Standish,  explaining  that  each 


THE  FIRST  FIGHT  33 


kernel  of  corn  held  the  secret  of  victory  over 
the  Pilgrim's  greatest  enemy,  starvation. 

Squanto  was  more  than  a  savage.  He  was  a 
successful  Indian  farmer.  He  could  be  quite 
as  cruel  as  any  of  the  rest  of  his  tribe  but  he 
knew  more  about  the  soil  and  crops  of  Ply- 
mouth than  the  Pilgrims  did,  and  he  liked  to 
plant  and  harvest.  He  felt  quite  rich  with  the 
white  men's  occasional  gifts  of  colored  beads, 
a  jack  knife,  a  pair  of  shoes  and  a  hat.  In 
return,  he  taught  them  his  methods  of  getting 
the  most  out  of  the  soil.  The  white  men  must 
plant  the  kernels  of  corn  in  hills  at  about  the 
time  in  spring  when  the  new  leaves  on  the 
oak  trees  were  the  size  of  a  field  mouse's  ear, 
he  told  them.  A  fish  buried  in  the  earth  of 
each  hill  of  corn  was  good  fertilizer  for  the 
corn;  the  seed  would  sprout  faster.  Pumpkin 
seed  could  be  planted  in  the  same  field  as  corn 
and  the  pumpkins  would  prove  excellent  food. 
In  the  meantime,  to  satisfy  hunger  while  this 
first  crop  was  in  the  ground,  there  was  plenty 
of  fish  to  be  had.  An  Indian  canoe  was  Hght 
and  small  enough  to  skim  over  almost  any 
waters  for  trout  and  salmon,  and  eels  could 


34 THE  FIRST  FIGHT 

be  had  by  treading  them  out  of  the  mud  with 
ones  bare  feet.  Such  food  made  a  feast  if 
properly  cooked.  All  this  food  knowledge 
was  Squanto's  and  he  taught  it  to  the  settlers 
of  Plymouth. 

Europe  had  known  nothing  of  Indian  corn. 
The  Pilgrims^  courage  was  high  as  they 
ploughed  and  planted,  and  saw  green  shoots 
pushing  their  way  up  through  the  earth,  and 
listened  to  Squanto's  instructions  about  grind- 
ing the  corn  into  meal,  and  cooking  it  in  a 
kettle,  or  moulding  it  into  cakes.  The  Spring 
grew  warmer  and  changed  to  summer.  Then 
it  was  the  harvest  time  of  the  year,  and  the 
little  log  houses  of  Plymouth  sunned  them- 
selves complacently,  surrounded  by  fields  of 
rich  grain  and  gardens  of  vegetables. 

Everybody  helped  his  neighbor  in  harvest- 
ing these  first,  most  precious  crops  of  Ply- 
mouth. There  was  reaping  and  binding  and 
grinding  to  be  done.  The  sound  of  a  drum 
called  all  the  able  bodied  Pilgrims  to  the  fields 
every  morning,  and  Captain  Standish  and  the 
governor  of  Plymouth,  William  Bradford, 
led  the  laborers  and  did  their  honest  share 


THE  FIRST  FIGHT  35 

of  the  work.  There  were  wild  geese  and 
turkeys,  water  fowl,  deer  and  partridges  to 
be  had  for  meat,  and  cornmeal  was  found  just 
as  palatable  and  nourishing  as  Squanto  had 
said  it  would  be.  In  November  of  1621  the 
Pilgrims  decided  to  spread  a  common  feast 
in  celebration  of  this  first  epoch  making  year 
just  ended  in  the  New  World. 

Now  that  flour  and  meat  were  at  hand  the 
English  housewives  had  a  chance  to  try  their 
skill  in  making  pies  and  puddings.  There 
were  quite  a  few  sober,  grave  eyed  boys  and 
girls  in  Plymouth  whose  faces  turned  to 
smiles  as  they  saw  a  long  table  set  with  pewter 
plates  and  flanked  by  rush  seated  chairs. 
It  was  to  be  their  first  harvest  home;  the 
whole  brave  family  of  Plymouth  was  going  to 
break  bread  at  one  table.  These  children  had 
their  share  in  the  preparation  for  the  feast. 
They  had  known  what  it  was  to  feel  cold  and 
hunger,  to  have  no  happiness  through  play, 
and  to  lose  their  fathers  and  mothers  even. 
That  was  all  out  of  mind  for  a  season,  though, 
as  they  gathered  nuts  and  brought  in  fire- 


36 THE  FIRST  FIGHT 

wood  and  piled  baskets  with  apples  in  readi- 
ness  for   the   feast. 

Suddenly,  almost  on  the  eve  of  the  Pil- 
grims' harvest  feast,  they  had  another  sur- 
prise. The  great  chief,  Massasoit,  with  his 
warriors  came  again  to  Plymouth.  News  of 
the  harvest  celebration  had  reached  him  and 
he  had  come  to  take  part  in  it. 

The  Indians  were  obUged  to  set  up  their 
camp  out  of  doors,  for  there  were  only  a  scant 
dozen  houses  in  Plymouth,  but  with  Massa- 
soit came  also  Indian  summer,  warm  and  soft, 
and  bright  with  sunshine.  His  most  skilled 
hunters  were  sent  out  to  the  forest  to  bring 
in  more  game,  and  the  Pilgrims  built  addi- 
tional tables  under  the  trees,  spread  with 
baked  clams,  broiled  fish,  roasted  turkey  and 
their  own  harvest  of  corn,  vegetables  and  fruit. 

Then  they  seated  themselves,  red  men  and 
white,  at  our  first  Thanksgiving  feast. 

It  was  also  our  first  peace  table.  These 
wandering  Pilgrims  for  freedom  had  found 
that  the  necessities  of  life  are  not  won  without 
a  struggle,  but  they  were  victors  in  their  first 
fight.    They  had  made  the  earth  supply  them 


They  seated  themselves,  redmen  and  white,  at  our 
first  Thanksgiving  table. 


THE  FIRST  FIGHT 37 

with  food.  They  had  built  themselves  homes. 
They  had  also  made  allies  of  the  Indians 
through  neighborliness  and  mutual  helpful- 
ness. It  was  a  very  good  foundation  which 
the  Pilgrims  had  laid  for  building  their  strong- 
hold of  hope,  a  new  England. 


THE  FREEMAN'S  CHARTER 

Stephen  Winthrop  was  puzzled,  but  he  did 
not  speak  of  his  wonder  even  to  his  younger 
brother,  Adam.  Perhaps  Adam  would  not 
understand  him,  Stephen  thought,  but  he  was 
a  lad  of  twelve  when  the  two  boys  made  the 
hazardous  trip  with  their  father  from  England 
and  he  could  remember  the  slightest  detail 
of  it.  Adam  was  three  years  younger  than 
Stephen  and  had  just  as  much  love  in  his 
heart  for  their  father,  Governor  John  Win- 
throp of  Massachusetts,  as  Stephen  had. 
But  Stephen  realized  that  his  father  was  a 
very  great  man  in  the  Massachusetts  colony. 
Stephen  was  proud  of  this  but  he  wondered 
how  it  had  come  about.  He  longed  to  know 
the  secret  of  his  father's  power  in  the  New 
World  city  of  Boston  in  which  they  lived. 

Stephen  remembered  England  just  before 
his  father  and  he  and  Adam  and  the  little 


THE  FREEMAN'S  CHARTER 39 

company  of  Puritans  had  set  out  in  the  sailing 
ship,  Arabella,  for  their  seventy  six  days 
voyage  across  the  Atlantic.  There  was  a  new 
king  in  England,  Charles  the  First,  who 
seemed  to  have  lost  sight  of  what  true  king- 
ship means.  His  throne  and  his  crown  were 
to  Charles  the  First  symbols  of  autocracy, 
not  of  a  just  rule.  He  invaded  the  rights  of 
the  English  people;  he  broke  his  word  to  his 
subjects. 

Stephen  could  see  in  imagination  the 
knights  and  gallants  of  the  court  of  the  king, 
dressed  in  velvet,  fine  Unen  and  lace  ruffs, 
carrying  jeweled  swords  and  looking  with 
scorn  on  such  plainly  garbed  people  as  John 
Winthrop  and  his  Puritan  friends  who  walked 
London's  streets  with  more  heart  for  the 
persecuted  than  did  these  CavaUers.  But 
there  was  much  talk  now  of  the  new  England, 
lying  on  the  other  side  of  the  ocean,  a  land  of 
corn  and  apples  and  yet  undiscovered  wealth 
and,  greatest  of  all,  freedom. 

That  was  why  John  Winthrop  had  sold  his 
beautiful  estate  in  England  and  become  poor 
for  liberty's  sake  as  he  helped  to  equip  the 


40 THE  FREEMAN'S  CHARTER 

Puritan's  expedition  and  set  sail  from  Cowes 
in  the  spring  of  the  year  1630.  Stephen  and 
Adam  Winthrop  of  twelve  and  nine  had  come 
then,  and  their  mother  would  follow  with  the 
other  children  when  there  was  a  home  ready 
for  her.  It  had  been  a  colossal  task  to  pre- 
pare a  home,  to  even  keep  alive  to  do  it.  This 
Puritan  lad  who  had  helped  his  father  found 
the  city  of  Boston  knew  that. 

At  Salem,  the  little  fishing  settlement  on  the 
coast  of  Massachusetts  to  which  their  ship 
drifted  first,  the  Indians  and  fisherman  had 
fed  the  Puritans  with  venison  and  wild  straw- 
berries but  this  was  at  a  sacrifice,  for  they  had 
scant  store  for  themselves.  Then  the  company 
had  sailed  farther  along  the  coast,  landed  and 
set  up  tents  and  log  shelters  at  what  is  now 
Charlestown.  The  Winthrop  boys  and  the 
other  of  the  Puritan's  sons  and  daughters  who 
survived,  cut  firewood  and  picked  blueberries 
and  dug  mussels  and  clams  for  food.  When 
the  corn  they  bought  from  the  Indians  gave 
out,  the  women  ground  acorns  into  flour  and 
used  this  for  bread. 

It  was  different  indeed  for  Stephen  from 


THE  FREEMAN'S  CHARTER 41 

his  days  of  drinking  cream  and  eating  roasted 
fowls  and  rich  pastries  in  their  great  stone 
castle  in  England.  But  he  saw  his  father 
tending  the  sick  and  sharing  their  last  baking 
of  bread  with  a  needy  neighbor.  John  Win- 
throp  was  farmer  and  physician  and  builder 
and  governor  all  in  one  that  first  season  in 
Massachusetts.  Stephen  was  daily  more 
proud  of  his  father  and  tried  to  be  like  him, 
but  he  wanted  to  know  why  John  Winthrop 
had  been  made  governor.  He  was  not  at  all 
like  the  men  in  power  who  they  had  just  left 
in  England.  But  a  Puritan  lad  of  those  days 
was  silent  and  thoughtful  and  had  so  great  a 
respect  for  his  parents  that  he  hesitated  to 
ask  what  might  seem  to  them  unreasonable 
questions. 

In  the  fall  of  the  same  year,  John  Winthrop 
had  seen  a  light  shining  on  Beacon  HilT, 
across  the  river  from  Charlestown.  Then  an 
invitation  came  from  the  hermit  who  lived 
alone  with  his  books  on  Beacon  Hill  for  the 
Puritans  to  join  him.  William  Blackstone 
was  the  hermit's  name,  and  he  could  offer 
Governor  Winthrop  a  garden,  a  spring  and  an 


42 THE  FREEMAN'S  CHARTER 

orchard!  Stephen  had  helped  load  the  half 
finished  framework  of  their  house  on  a  boat 
to  take  it  across.  He  and  Adam  and  his 
father  wient  with  the  precious  boards  that 
were  going  to  build  walls  and  a  roof  for  their 
mother,  but  Stephen  noticed  that  Governor 
Winthrop  carried  a  bit  of  parchment  securely- 
wrapped  and  tied  and  hidden  underneath 
his  cloak.  He  was  as  jealous  of  this  parchment 
and  guarded  it  as  carefully  as  he  did  the  boat^s 
cargo  of  wood  and  food.  He  had  guarded  it, 
also,  on  the  way  from  England.  Stephen 
wondered  if  the  secret  of  his  father's  power 
in  New  England  might  not  be  written  on  this 
parchment    scroll. 

The  Winthrop's  small  frame  house  was  set 
up  and  presently  Stephen  could  look  out  of 
one  of  the  oiled  paper  windows,  down  the 
green  lane  that  led  to  the  water  side  and  to- 
ward the  market  place.  His  mother  had  come. 
The  whir  of  Mistress  Winthrop's  spinning 
wheel  could  be  heard  in  the  kitchen  and  there 
was  quite  a  company  of  English  folk  and 
Indians  to  be  seen  on  their  way  to  market. 
It  was  now  the  year  1631.    More  ships  bear- 


THE  FREEMAN'S  CHARTER  43 

ing  more  Puritans  had  reached  Massachusetts 
Bay.  The  town  of  Boston  was  founded, 
facing  the  great  water  way  of  the  Atlantic 
Ocean  and  with  unbounded  land  back  of  it 
for  exploring,  settling  and  planting.  The 
town  had  a  harbor  for  shipping  and  space 
for  growth  such  as  had  been  only  dreamed  of 
in  England.  The  achievement  of  building 
Boston  had  been  worth  that  first  winter  of 
digging  clams  and  gathering  acorns. 

The  everyday  business  of  the  town  was  of 
unfailing  interest  to  Stephen  and  his  friends, 
the  Puritan  lads  of  the  time.  He  saw  only 
scattering,  one  story  buildings  and  country 
paths  from  his  windows  but  the  workers  of  a 
prosperous  community  were  there.  Carpen- 
ters, masons,  stone-cutters,  joiners,  black- 
smiths, cobblers  and  all  kinds  of  artisans  had 
voyaged  across  to  Boston.  The  men  were 
hunting,  fishing,  digging,  planting  and  reaping 
to  fill  hungry  mouths,  and  the  women  were 
spinning  and  weaving  and  stitching  their 
cloth  into  garments.  The  Indians  were 
friendly  and  brought  corn  and  vegetables  and 
skins  to  Boston  by  forest  trails  or  in  their 


44 THE  FREEMAN'S  CHARTER 

canoes.  There  was  not  as  great  danger  from 
wild  beasts  as  there  had  been  a  year  before. 
The  men  of  Boston  had  built  a  wall,  guarded 
by  an  officer  and  six  men  with  muskets  to 
keep  out  the  wolves.  There  was  also  a  sentry 
posted  on  Beacon  Hill.  A  tall,  stout  mast 
with  an  arm  on  the  top  that  held  a  kettle 
of  tar,  had  been  set  up  to  be  lighted  as  a 
signal  if  wolves  or  hostile  Indians  should  be 
sighted. 

Boston  was  safe  and  busy  and  happy  and 
honorable.  Most  of  all  was  it  proud  of 
Stephen's  father,  the  Governor  and  organizer 
of  the  Massachusetts  Bay  settlement.  The 
Indians  gave  the  town  little  trouble;  if  there 
were  differences  with  the  colonists,  John 
Winthrop  settled  them.  He  was  planning  a 
forty  mile  tramp  south  through  the  New 
England  wilderness  to  Plymouth  to  strengthen 
the  friendship  between  the  Pilgrims  and  the 
Puritans.  He  led  the  town  meetings  wisely. 
He  worked  in  his  garden  and  helped  with  the 
town's  building  and  practised  the  same  thrift 
that  he  asked  of  his  people.  Boston  folk  were 
free,  but  they  looked  to  Governor  Winthrop 


THE  FREEMAN'S  CHARTER  45 

for  leadership  and  counsel.  Whenever  he 
walked  through  the  lanes  of  Boston  in  his 
long  dark  cloak,  stiff  ruff  and  stout  boots,  he 
was  followed  and  surrounded  by  the  towns- 
folk, glad  to  see  him,  and  eager  for  his  advice 
and    help. 

Stephen  Winthrop  stood  up  very  straight 
as  he  thought  of  the  place  of  honor  in  New 
England  his  father  occupied.  Then  he  left 
the  window  and  crossed  the  sanded  floor  to- 
ward the  low  doorv\^ay.  It  was  Tuesday, 
market  day,  and  he  thought  that  he  would 
go  down  to  the  square  and  look  on  for  a  while 
at  the  trading.  There  would  be  baskets  of 
green  beans  and  peas,  red  apples,  sacks  of 
yellow  corn,  strings  of  fish  and  possibly  some 
wild  turkeys  to  be  seen.  Indians  in  gay 
blankets  would  mingle  with  the  Puritan 
housewives  in  their  straight  gray  gowns.  The 
Indians  might  have  colored  shells  and  beads  to 
sell.  The  Boston  market  was  always  an  m- 
teresting  place. 

At  the  door,  though,  Stephen  stopped. 
John  Winthrop  sat  at  a  table  at  one  end  of  the 
room,  his  quill  pen,  ink  stone  and  a  sheet  of 


4G  THE  FREEMAN'S  CHARTER 

unwritten  paper  in  front  of  him.  He  held  an 
opened  letter  in  his  hand  that  had  come  from 
England  by  the  last  sailing  vessel  which  had 
docked  at  Boston  Harbor.  Stephen  saw,  to 
his  amazement,  that  it  bore  the  stamp  of  the 
English  crown. 

Governor  Winthrop  read  and  then  reread 
the  letter,  his  face  growing,  first,  troubled  and 
then  stern.  At  last  he  laid  the  king's  message 
on  the  table  and  unlocked  a  strong  box  that 
stood  at  his  side.  He  took  out  the  bit  of 
parchment  and,  unrolling  it,  spread  it  out, 
and  looked  at  its  writing  long  and  carefully. 
Then  he  wrote,  sprinkled  his  writing  with  sand 
and  folded  it,  addressing  his  message  to  King 
Charles  the  First  of  England. 

Stephen  Winthrop  could  wait  no  longer. 
He  was  a  young  Puritan  and  he  had  a  great 
desire  to  understand  this  older  Puritan  who 
was  helping  to  build  a  republic  from  the  city 
of  Beacon  Hill. 

'Tell  me  about  the  bit  of  parchment  that 
you  brought  from  England,  Sir,''  the  lad 
begged.  ''Does  it  make  you  the  King  of 
Boston?'' 


THE  FREEMAN'S  CHARTER  47 

Governor  Winthrop  put  his  hand  on  the 
boy's  shoulder  and  smiled.  ^'No,  not  a  king 
in  New  England/'  he  said,  '^only  the  leader 
and  guide  of  a  free  people  who  are  kings  in 
their  own  right  if  so  be  it  they  conduct  them- 
selves righteously/'  He  pointed  to  the  words 
on  the  parchment.  ^The  charter  of  the 
Massachusetts  Bay  Colony,"  he  explained, 
''given  to  me  as  governor  of  Massachusetts 
by  his  majesty,  King  Charles  the  First  of 
England.  It  grants  me  as  governor,  ap- 
pointed by  the  king,  the  power  to  execute 
the  wishes  of  the  people  as  expressed  in  the 
laws  they  make.  We,  of  New  England,  are 
given  the  rights  of  natural  born  freemen.  We 
can  make  our  own  laws,  correct,  pardon, 
cultivate  the  land,  and  trade  as  freemen. 
When  my  term  as  governor  is  over,  another 
leader  of  Massachusetts  will  be  chosen  in  my 
place  by  all  the  people." 

''And  King  Charles  wishes  to  revoke  the 
charter  of  the  Massachusetts  Bay  Colony, 
sir?"  Stephen  asked,  guessing  what  the  letter 
from  the  crown  was  about. 

"He  was  in  a  strangely  good  humor  when 


48 THE  FREEMAN'S  CHARTER 

he  granted  it,"  Governor  Winthrop  answered. 
'^He  thought,  mayhap,  that  our  expedition 
would  fail,  that  we  would  not  be  able  to  bring 
the  high  courage  of  old  England  with  us, 
here,  to  New  England.  Yes,  lad,  the  king  has 
sent  for  our  charter  but  I  have  written  that 
we  can  not  give  it  up." 

Stephen  had  discovered  the  secret  of  the 
greatness  by  means  of  which  his  father  was 
safeguarding  freedom  in  Massachusetts,  his 
treasuring  of  this  bit  of  parchment  that  made 
every  man  free  in  his  own  right  if  only  he  had 
the  quaUties  of  a  free  man.  Stephen  Winthrop 
was  to  grow  to  young  manhood  and  see  his 
father  elected  governor  for  twelve  of  the  nine- 
teen years  that  he  lived  in  the  colony.  Again 
and  again  the  charter  was  demanded  by  the 
throne  of  England,  but  civil  war  arose,  and 
Governor  Winthrop  was  able  to  hold  the 
charter  by  his  great  tact  and  wisdom. 

Stephen  and  his  father  sat  together  until 
the  town  was  quiet  after  the  pleasant  hub-bub 
of  market  day,  the  sun  had  set  and  candles 
began  to  twinkle  through  the  windows  of 
other  houses,     There  were  no  lamps  along 


THE  FREEMAN'S  CHARTER 49 

the  streets  or  light  houses  for  the  rocky  shore 
on  which  the  surf  beat  and  tumbled.  Occa- 
sionally the  far  away  cry  of  a  wolf  could  be 
heard,  or  the  shrill  call  of  an  Indian  in  the 
nearby  woods.  Suddenly,  the  two  heard  a 
sound  of  footsteps  in  the  narrow  byways  of 
the  town.  Up  one  lane  and  down  another 
they  went  and  at  each  lonely  house  a 
watchman  of  New  England  called,  ^^All^s 
Well!'^ 

It  was  well,  so  far,  for  our  liberty.  Explorer, 
Pilgrim  and  Puritan  had  found  a  new  land 
and  settled  in  it.  They  had  conquered  man's 
first  enemy,  hunger,  and  had  made  a  begin- 
ning of  neighborliness  with  the  Indians.  Now 
the  great  step  of  government  by  the  people 
had  been  taken,  a  milestone  along  the  road 
on  which  democracy  was  building. 


FOLLOWING  THE  BEAVER'S  TRAIL 

Tuenis  Jansen,  of  Amersfoort  in  Holland, 
laid  his  hand  on  the  big  brass  knocker  of  the 
house  in  New  Amsterdam,  America,  where  he 
was  to  live.  The  knocker  was  in  the  shape 
of  a  dog's  head,  made  of  solid  brass  and 
polished  until  it  shone  like  gold.  Tuenis 
Hfted  it  curiously  and  was  of  a  mind  to  let  it 
fall  with  a  clang,  calling  the  good  Dutch 
housewife  from  her  kitchen  to  welcome  him, 
a  lad  of  eighteen  who  had  just  arrived  at 
Manhattan  Island  on  a  sailing  ship,  the 
Gilded  Beaver.  Then  he  hesitated  a  second, 
looking  about  him  at  the  strange  sights  in  this 
busy,  thriving  town  of  the  New  World. 

For  a  long  time  Tuenis  had  wanted  to  see 
New  Amsterdam  in  America.  He  felt  that  he 
belonged  there  in  a  way,  because  his  grand- 
father had  sailed  up  the  Hudson  River  in  the 
Half  Moon  with  the  explorer,  Henry  Hudson, 
fifty  years  before.     He  had  come  again  and 


FOLLOWING  THE  BEAVER'S  TRAIL 51 

again  to  the  log  warehouse  that  the  traders 
had  built  on  the  Island  of  Manhattan  to  buy 
beaver's  pelts  from  the  Indians  and  sell  them 
again  on  the  other  side  of  the  ocean. 

Tuenis'  father,  also,  had  told  the  lad 
stories  of  what  had  happened  on  this  island  at 
the  mouth  of  the  Hudson  River  after  his 
grandfather  had  died.  The  Hollanders  had 
bought  the  entire  Island  of  Manhattan  in  1626 
from  the  Indians  for  what  the  red  men  con- 
sidered a  just  price,  twenty  four  dollars  worth 
of  brass  buttons,  bright  red  cloth,  large  glass 
beads  of  all  the  colors  in  the  rainbow  and 
some  ribbons.  Several  log  houses,  each  one 
built  by  the  head  of  a  family,  clustered  about 
the  storehouse  soon,  and  wind  mills  for  grind- 
ing grain  began  to  turn  their  white  sails  in 
the   sunshine. 

Then  trading  began.  The  red  men  brought 
beaver  and  fox  and  bear  and  cony  and  even 
occasional  seal  skins  in  their  canoes  or  by 
trail  to  the  fort  on  Manhattan  Island  where 
the  Dutch  traders  paid  them,  with  the  utmost 
honesty,  whatever  they  asked  for  these  furs. 
Usually  it  was  a  question  of  paying  in  bright 


52 FOLLOWING  THE  BEAVER'S  TRAIL      . 

jack  knives,  little  polished  hand  mirrors  or 
Indian  money  made  out  of  clam  shells  and 
strung  on  threads  of  sinew  or  fastened  to 
deerskin  belts.  These  had  value  in  the 
Indians^  eyes.  Tuenis^  father  had  said  that 
this  was  an  excellent  arrangement,  for  it  kept 
peace  with  the  Indians  and  brought  prosperity 
to  the  colonists.  Tuenis  had  heard  these  tales 
from  the  sailors  as  they  sat  on  the  edge  of  the 
canal  at  home.  He  had  not  been  able  to  stay 
away  from  New  Amsterdam,  and  here  he  was, 
having  worked  his  passage  in  a  sailing  packet, 
and  really  arrived,  in  1657. 

The  house  before  whose  quaint  half  door 
he  stood  was  not  built  of  logs  but  of  wood  and 
stone,  and  the  ends  were  a  kind  of  patch  work 
of  black  and  yellow  Dutch  bricks.  Over  the 
half  opened  door  Tuenis  could  see  a  v/ell 
scrubbed  and  sanded  floor,  a  huge  fireplace 
with  platters  of  wood  and  pewter  ranged 
in  long  rows  in  the  plate  racks  above  it,  and 
a  noisy  old  clock  with  a  moon  face  ticking 
busily  in  the  corner.  There  was  a  pleasant 
odor  of  frying  crullers.  It  might  have  been 
his  own  home  in  Holland,  Tuenis  thought, 


FOLLOWING  THE  BEAVER'S  TRAIL  53 

and  here  he  was  thousands  of  miles  away  in 
the  New  World. 

A  sound  of  tapping  heels  along  the  nar- 
row, cobble  paved  street  came  to  the  lad,  and 
he  turned  to  see  who  might  be  passing.  He 
had  come  up  a  green  path  from  the  wharf  and 
had  passed  the  stone  fort  with  its  mounted 
guns  and  quite  a  settlement  of  these  low, 
gabled  houses.  Here  were  the  men  and  women 
of  New  Amsterdam,  looking  as  if  they  had 
just  stepped  off  the  pleasant  banks  of  the 
Zuyder  Zee. 

A  housemother  passed  in  a  bright  linsey- 
woolsey  gown,  a  gay  little  cap  of  quilted  calico 
on  her  head  and  wearing  red  worsted  stock- 
ings and  shoes  with  silver  buckles.  She  wore 
a  velvet  girdle  and  hung  from  it  by  chains  of 
silver  were  the  keys  of  her  pantry,  her  scissors 
and  her  pincushion.  Behind  her  came  a 
Dutch  trader  in  cloth  breeches,  silver  buttons 
on  his  coat  and  wearing  a  high  wide  brimmed 
hat  of  beaver  worth  many  guilders.  He  was 
smoking  a  long  stemmed  pipe  and  looking  at 
the  bill  of  lading  for  his  last  cargo  to  Europe. 
There  were  children,  too,  running  by  and 


64 FOLLOAVING  THE  BEAVER'S  TRAIL 

kitchen  gardens  could  be  seen  just  across  the 
street.  Tuenis  was  so  fascinated  by  this  New 
World  settlement  that  he  still  lingered  on  the 
doorstep.  Just  as  he  was  about  to  drop  the 
knocker,  he  heard  another  sound  that  stopped 
him. 

Tap,  tap  J  tap  J  it  came  nearer. 

^^Old  Silver  Legs,  by  my  word!"  the  lad 
exclaimed.  Then  he  slipped  farther  into  the 
shadow  of  the  doorway  as  a  soldier  in  a  velvet 
cloak,  lace  collar  and  plumed  hat,  and  with  a 
wooden  leg  bound  with  silver  bands  tramped 

by. 

^ ^Governor  Peter  Stuyvesant  of  New  Amster- 
dam, peppery,  strong  willed,  of  a  very  bad 
temper,  but  brave  and  honest,"  Tuenis 
thought,  remembering  the  tales  he  had  heard 
of  this  fier}^  leader.     And  the  lad  was  right. 

When  Peter  Stuyvesant's  rule  of  energy  and 
terror  was  over  and  he  was  obliged  to  sur- 
render New  Amsterdam  to  England  in  1664 
and  see  the  Dutch  flag  lowered  he  did  not 
retire  to  the  shelter  of  Holland.  Instead,  he 
settled  down  as  a  farmer  in  New  York  and 
made   friends   with   the   new   governor   and 


Why,  Tuenis  Jansen !    Welcome  to  New 
Amsterdam !" 


FOLLOWING  THE  BEAVER'S  TRAIL  55 

showed  what  a  good  loser  an  old  soldier  with 
a  wooden  leg  could  be. 

'^Why,  Tuenis  Jansen!  Welcome  to  New 
Amsterdam."  A  pair  of  laughing  blue  eyes 
and  two  rosy  cheeks  framed  in  a  white  cap 
faced  the  lad  across  the  door.  '^Come  in! 
Mother  and  father  were  expecting  you  by  the 
Golden  Beaver  and  there  is  a  sleeping  bench 
for  you  under  the  eaves,  and  I  have  laid  a 
place  for  you  at  the  table."  Tuenis  smiled 
back  at  the  girl,  a  few  years  younger  than  he, 
who  opened  the  door  for  him.  It  was  Grietje 
Yerrenton,  who  he  had  known  as  a  neighbor 
in  Holland.  Her  father  had  been  his  father's 
friend  and  companion  in  their  earlier  days  of 
exploring  and  trapping  along  the  Hudson. 

'^Greetings,  Grietje,"  Tuenis  replied  going 
into  the  comfortable,  plain  httle  room.  '^1 
am  glad  to  be  here  in  New  Amsterdam." 

Food  and  lodging  must  be  paid  for  in  this 
busy  little  town,  Tuenis  soon  found.  His 
host,  Mynheer  Yerrenton,  spoke  of  this  the 
next  day. 

'We  need  ships  and  still  more  ships,  lad," 
he  said,     '^li  I  am  not  mistaken,  you  were 


50  FOLLOWING  THE  BEAVER'S  TRAIL 

apprenticed  to  a  carpenter  in  Amersfoort  and 
your  trade  will  stand  us  in  good  stead  here. 
I  will  find  you  work  in  the  shipyard  today.'* 

So  Tuenis  put  on  a  leather  apron  and 
changed  his  buckled  shoes  for  wooden  ones  and 
went  to  work.  He  liked  it,  for  every  one  was 
working  for  the  prosperity  and  growth  of  this 
trading  station  on  Manhattan  Island.  Wood 
cutters  were  busy  in  the  surrounding  forests 
cutting  timber  for  shaping  hulls,  beams,  posts 
and  spars  for  a  ship  that  was  to  stand  eight 
or  twelve  hundred  tons  of  cargo.  Other  timber 
was  being  cut  and  drawn  for  building  a  saw- 
mill and  a  gristmill.  Some  enterprising 
Dutchmen  had  begun  making  clay  bricks, 
extracting  potash  from  wood  ashes,  and  salt 
from  the  sea  water.  Oyster  shells  were  being 
collected  for  the  lime  they  contained.  These 
products,  beyond  what  was  needed  for  the 
town  and  the  farms  that  were  spreading  north, 
along  the  Hudson  River,  were  to  be  used  for 
trade.  Every  one  seemed  to  have  a  great 
desire  to  build  business. 

As  he  stood  high  upon  a  platform  in  the 
shipyard,  shaping  a  hull,  and  could  see  on  one 


FOLLOWING  THE  BEAVER'S  TRAIL 67 

side  of  him  the  boundless  waters  of  the  harbor 
and  on  the  other  the  green  trail  through  the 
forest  that  took  its  way  as  far  as  the  northern 
fort  at  Albany,  Tuenis  sometimes  wondered 
how  the  comfort  and  prosperity  in  which  he 
lived  had  come.  The  Island  of  Manhattan 
was  surrounded  by  a  wilderness  still;  it  was 
not  so  long  ago  that  it  had  been  a  wilderness 
itself. 

"I  can  tell  you,"  Grietje  Yerrenton  said 
laughingly  to  Tuenis  that  night  as  the  two 
sat  beside  the  fire,  and  the  lad  had  said 
wonderingly,  "What  makes  New  Amsterdam 
so  thriving?" 

"We're  safe  from  the  little  Dutch  goblin," 
Grietje  went  on,  lowering  her  voice  mysteri- 
ously.   "He  hasn't  found  us  yet." 

"The  goblin?"    Tuenis    queried. 

"Yes,"  Grietje  shook  her  yellow  braids 
decisively.  "He  lives  on  the  top  of  the  great 
Dunderberg  mountain  up  the  Hudson  River 
near  the  Highlands.  He  wears  a  hat  shaped 
like  one  of  our  sugar  loaves,  and  he  has  very 
great  power.  If  he  should  take  it  into  his 
head  to  come  down  to  New  Amsterdam,  or 


58  FOLLOWING  THE  BEAVER'S  TRAIL 

if  the  wind  should  blow  even  his  hat  through 
our  lanes,  our  luck  would  go.'' 

^'Oh,  Grietje,  where  is  your  common  sense?'' 
Tuenis  laughed  and  the  girl  laughed  too. 
Then  they  were  silent,  each  thinking.  Could 
it  be  that  some  mysterious  influence  made  the 
sun  shine  on  this  little  New  World  colony  as 
it  had  not  shone  on  any  of  the  other  colonies 
as  yet,  they  wondered? 

A  year  of  ship  building,  and  then  Tuenis 
could  stand  it  no  longer.  The  roving  spirit 
of  his  grandfather,  Henry  Hudson's  mate,  and 
his  father,  the  trapper,  filled  his  heart. 

^^The  lad  wants  to  go  for  an  adventure," 
Mynheer  Yerrenton  said  to  his  wife.  'There 
is  a  bark  sailing  up  the  Hudson  for  pelts  this 
spring.  I  will  see  that  Tuenis  has  a  chance  to 
go  with  the  traders  and  have  a  taste  of  the 
wild  life  up  north." 

So  Tuenis  took  passage  on  a  sailing  boat, 
so  small  that  it  merited  the  Indians'  name  of 
a  white  bird.  It  was  stored  with  provisions 
and  those  bright  trinkets  that  had  value  in  the 
eyes  of  the  Iroquois  tribe  into  whose  wilder- 
ness kingdom  on  either  side  of  the  Hudson 


FOLLOWING  THE  BEAVER'S  TRAIL  59 

this  little  band  of  white  men  fearlessly 
journeyed.  A  few  hours  away  from  the 
shelter  of  the  fort  and  the  friendly  candlelight 
from  the  little  windows  of  New  Amsterdam, 
and  there  was  no  sight  of  any  habitation. 
Great  wooded  hills  shut  the  traders  in,  and  the 
only  sounds  were  the  sharp  calls  of  the  foxes 
or  the  cries  of  Indians.  There  were  trading 
posts  along  the  way  for  many  miles,  but  so 
isolated  that  they  were  often  a  day's  sail 
apart.  The  Dutch  farms,  called  poltroons, 
hugged  the  shores  of  the  river  near  enough  to 
New  Amsterdam  to  claim  its  protection. 

The  trip  would  have  been  a  great  adventure 
for  any  lad,  particularly  for  Tuenis  Jansen 
whose  ancestors  had  sailed  this  great  Hudson 
river  before.  Most  of  all,  he  was  interested 
in  that  green  trail  along  the  bank  which  had 
started  at  New  Amsterdam  and  could  still  be 
seen,  although  it  was  sometimes  lost  in  the 
dense  forest  that  grew  deeper  the  farther 
north  they  sailed.  The  Broad  Way  it  came 
to  be  called  later. 

After  a  few  days  out,  a  thunder  storm  came 
up  and  the  trading  sloop  rocked  like  a  toy 


60 FOLLOWING  THE  BEAVER'S  TRAIL 

boat.  Through  the  darkness  the  sailors 
could  see  a  mountain,  raising  its  head  above 
the  hills;  as  they  approached  it  a  great  cloud 
on  its  peak  seemed  to  burst  and  descend  upon 
the  little  ship. 

"The  goblin^s  hat!  The  goblin's  sugar  loaf 
hat!''  the  cry  went  up  suddenly  from  the 
terrified  sailors.  As  Tuenis  ran  to  the  bow  of 
the  vessel  and  looked  up  in  the  direction  they 
pointed,  it  did  seem  as  if  there  was  a  little 
pointed  white  hat  resting  on  the  mast  head. 
No  one  dared  climb  up  and  take  it  down. 
Ever  since  New  Amsterdam  had  been  settled 
there  had  been  rumors  of  the  evil  this  goblin 
of  Dunderberg  mountain  could  work.  The 
ship  rolled  and  rocked,  in  continual  danger 
of  overturning  or  of  being  thrown  up  on  the 
rocks  of  the  shore.  In  this  perilous  way  she 
drove  through  the  Highlands  of  the  Hudson. 

Then  she  was  clear  of  Dunderberg,  the 
storm  lifted,  and  those  of  the  sailors  who  had 
seen  the  goblin's  sugar  loaf  hat  said  that  it 
rose  from  the  mast  and  whirled  through  the 
air  like  a  top,  up  to  the  mountain.  The  ship 
settled  back  and  the  Hudson  was  as  smooth 


FOLLOWING  THE  BEAVER'S  TRAIL       61 

as  a  mill  pond.  There,  again,  was  the  green 
trail  along  the  bank,  broader,  and  filled  with 
Indian  braves,  painted  and  wearing  their 
feather  headdresses  to  welcome  the  traders. 
There  was  a  log  trading  station  near  the  bank, 
its  walls  hung  with  valuable  skins  and  pelts, 
so  the  party  landed  to  rest  for  the  night,  take 
on  a  cargo,  and  then  start  home. 

It  took  courage  for  Tuenis  to  sleep  that 
night  on  a  bed  of  skins  with  Indians  lying  near 
him,  the  glow  of  their  camp  fire  in  his  eyes 
and  the  hooting  of  owls  in  his  ears.  Perhaps 
that  is  why  he  awoke  so  early  and  went  over 
at  daybreak  to  the  building  where  the  trading 
had  already  begun.  Soup  for  all  was  cooking 
over  a  great  out  door  fire  and  there  was  a  lively 
kind  of  bargaining  going  on  as  the  traders 
selected  their  furs  and  the  Indians  their  scarlet 
cloth  or  buttons  or  beads. 

Tuenis  looked  along  the  trail,  wondering 
again.  As  far  as  he  could  see  this  Broad  Way 
of  the  traders  stretched  north,  a  road  leading 
to  traps  and  valuable  trees  and  rich  land  that 
would  yield  food.  As  soon  as  their  business 
was  over,  the  traders  would  sail  back  to  New 


62 FOLLOWING  THE  BEAVER'S  TRAIL 

Amsterdam  at  the  sea  port  end  of  the  trail, 
with  its  tides  waiting  for  ships,  and  its  ships 
waiting  for  cargoes,  and  the  Old  World  wait- 
ing to  buy. 

Here,  Tuenis  realized  all  at  once,  was  the 
secret  of  New  Amsterdam's  prosperity.  Her 
thrifty  burghers  had  cut  a  trail  through  the 
wilderness  that  meant  the  beginnings  of  busi- 
ness for  America,  honest  buying  and  selling, 
and  a  short  cut  between  supply  and  demand. 
Not  even  the  sugar  loaf  hat  of  the  Dunderberg 
goblin  could  work  evil  to  New  Amsterdam  if 
she  continued  to  broaden  the  trail  that  led 
from  the  beaver's  lodge  and  the  Indian's 
wigwam  down  the  river  to  the  sea  and  the 
ships. 

Tuenis  grew  up  and  married  and  lived  to 
see  trouble  come  to  New  Amsterdam  through 
Indian  warfare  and  foreign  disputes  over  the 
ownership  of  the  Island  of  Manhattan.  But 
the  difficulties  were  settled.  He  and  Grietje 
built  their  own  house  after  the  fashion  of 
Holland  and  followed  the  good  example  of 
Peter  Stuyvesant  who  found  New  York  as 


FOLLOWING  THE  BEAVER'S  TRAIL 63 

comfortable  a  place  to  live  in  as  New  Amster- 
dam had  been. 

They  were  proud  of  the  new  seal  of  New 
York  on  which  were  stamped  a  beaver,  a 
windmill  and  a  barrel  of  flour.  It  was,  also, 
one  of  the  seals  of  our  liberty,  for  it  represented 
the  development  of  honest  business  and  thrift, 
domestic  trade  and  commerce,  without  which 
no  people  can  be  free  from  the  foe  of  poverty. 


AT  THE  GATE  OF  OLD  HARVARD 

Cotton  Mather  sat  in  the  doorway  of 
Master  Ezekial  Cheever^s  grammar  school  in 
Boston,  a  lead  plummet  in  his  hand  and  a 
measure  of  corn  and  vegetables  on  the 
threshold  at  his  side.  Tt  was  nearing  the  end 
of  the  seventeenth  century  and  there  were 
schools  now  in  New  England. 

Cotton  was  the  son  of  Increase  Mather,  who 
was  very  well  thought  of  in  Boston  because 
of  his  great  learning,  and  Cotton,  himself,  at 
twelve  years  was  about  the  brightest  boy  in 
Master  Cheever^s  Latin  class.  He  knew  it, 
too,  and  he  had  rather  enjoyed  the  whispered 
comments  of  the  other  boys  when  he  had  been 
chosen  to  sit  there  in  the  door  and  watch  for  a 
passing  customer  for  the  basket  of  garden 
truck. 

''Cotton  Mather,  as  learned  as  his  father!" 
was  what  they  said,  with  suppressed  titters. 

They  looked  upon  him  as  a  prig,  Cotton 


AT  THE  GATE  OF  OLD  HARVARD 66 

thought.  Well,  let  them.  It  had  given  him 
this  opportunity  to  study  in  the  sunshine 
instead  of  in  the  small,  crowded  school  room. 
The  basket  at  his  feet  represented  part  of  old 
Master  Cheever^s  salary  as  school  master  and 
some  boy  had  to  watch  for  a  customer  who 
would  pay  for  this  harvest  from  the  school 
field  near  by  in  wampum,  beaver  pelts  or 
some  other  currency  of  the  time.  The  school 
boys  had  to  help  cultivate  the  school  field  and 
pick  the  corn  and  beans  and  peas,  so  they 
were  always  interested  in  getting  a  good  price 
for  them. 

Cotton^s  thoughts  were  wool-gathering.  He 
was  supposed  to  copy  on  his  ruled  sheets  of 
foolscap  ten  times  this  sentence  which  had 
been  handed  down  to  these  younger  Puritans 
by  their  Puritan  fathers: 

"Unless  schools  and  colleges  flourish  the 
state  cannot  Kve." 

There  was  no  reason  why  Cotton  should 
not  fill  his  copy  book  with  neat,  small  script 
for  his  was  an  excellent,  well  sharpened  plum- 
met. They  were  making  plummets  now  in 
Boston  by  pouring  melted  lead  into  little 


AT  THE  GATE  OF  OLD  HARVARD 


wooden  moulds  and  then  cutting  away  the 
wood  with  a  jack  knife.  These  plummets 
were  moulded  in  very  interesting  shapes,  like 
a  woodcutter's  axe,  a  cannon,  or  a  battledore. 
Cotton's  plummet  was  shaped  like  an  Indian's 
tomahawk  and  he  had  tied  it  securely  to  his 
ruler  by  a  hemp  string  so  as  not  to  lose  it. 
But  instead  of  writing  with  it,  he  looked  back 
over  his  shoulder  into  the  school  room,  think- 
ing what  good  luck  his  was  in  escaping  Master 
Cheever's  glaring  spectacles  for  even  a  half 
hour. 

The  school  house  was  small  and  crowded. 
It  was  built  of  logs  with  bark  shingles  to  pro- 
tect the  sloping  roof,  and  the  windows  turned 
on  hinges  and  had  small,  diamond  shaped 
glass  panes.  There  were  pegs  driven  in  the 
walls  on  all  four  sides  of  the  room  at  a  con- 
venient height,  and  long  boards  laid  across 
these  pegs  made  the  older  boys'  desks.  The 
little  chaps  sat  on  log  benches  in  the  center 
of  the  room  within  easy  reach  of  Master 
Cheever's  birch  rod.  There  was  not  a  picture, 
a  black-board  or  a  plant  to  be  seen,  and  the 
walls  and  ceiling  were  dingy  from  the  thick 


AT  THE  GATE  OF  OLD  HARVARD 67 

smoke  that  the  great  fireplace  sent  up  in  the 
winter. 

Master  Cheever,  an  odd  figure  in  his  long 
black  coat  and  knee  breeches,  black  skull  cap, 
and  with  his  white  beard  reaching  to  his 
leather  belt  rose.  The  class  in  Latin  was  to 
stand  before  him  and  recite.  The  boys  looked 
like  great,  great  grandfathers  in  their  square 
skirted  coats  and  trousers  with  buttons  at 
the  knees.  They  were  little  lads  to  be  learning 
Latin  so  early.  But  they  knew  that  they  were 
the  future  makers  of  New  England — doctors 
with  pill  bags,  lawyers  with  important  rolls  of 
parchment  and  the  ministers  who  would 
preach  hour  long  sermons  in  the  years  to 
come.  They  valiantly  struggled  through 
their  verbs  and  conjugations  and  then  made 
place  for  the  class  in  arithmetic.  These  boys 
were  going  to  be  ship  masters  some  day,  send- 
ing vessels  to  the  West  Indies  for  sugar  and 
coffee  and  to  England  for  fine  broadcloth  and 
manufactured  wares.  They  would  stand 
behind  the  shop  counters  in  Boston  measuring 
out  corn  and  cambric  and  tape  and  ribbon; 
or  they  would  wield  a  blacksmith^s  hammer, 


68        AT  THE  GATE  OF  OLD  HARVARD 

or  learn  the  trade  of  carpentry  or  shoemaking 
or  tailoring.  So  they,  in  turn,  struggled  with 
the  multiplication  tables  and  the  tables  of 
weights  and  measures,  urged  on  by  Master 
Cheever's  rod. 

Cotton,  watching,  felt  rather  supercihous. 
He  knew  the  Latin  verbs  and  conjugations  for 
the  day  and  he  could  have  repeated  those 
arithmetic  tables  backward.  He  turned  away 
from  the  row  of  toiling  boys  and  the  sound  of 
their  droning  voices,  looking  across  the  road 
toward  the  green  common.  It  was  a  very 
pleasant  day  in  fall  and  the  smell  of  the  salt 
water  was  in  the  air. 

Cotton  saw  an  Indian  sauntering  along  the 
road  that  led  toward  Newtowne.  He  was 
probably  on  his  way  home  to  the  forest, 
having  sold  some  skins  at  the  Boston  market. 
Cotton  surmised.  He  laid  down  his  plummet 
and  picked  up  Master  Cheever^s  vegetables, 
running  after  the  Indian  who  turned  when  he 
heard  footsteps  and  looked  gravely  at  the 
yellow  corn  and  fat  green  beans.  Cotton 
gesticulated,  pointing  to  the  basket  and  then 
to  the  Indian's  belt,  and  the  red  man  grunted 


AT  THE  GATE  OF  OLD  HARVARD 


at  last,  understanding.  He  took  a  handful 
of  lead  bullets  from  a  pocket  in  his  belt  and 
gave  them  to  Cotton,  taking  the  basket  from 
him  in  return  and  stalking  off  with  it.  The 
boy  counted  the  bullets;  he  had  made  a  good 
bargain.  He  tied  them  up  in  his  handker- 
chief and  then  stood  a  moment  considering. 
At  last  he  made  his  decision.  He  was  going 
to  play  truant.  He  struck  off  down  the  road 
in  whose  green  lengths  the  Indian  had  now 
disappeared,  the  road  that  led  to  Newtowne. 

Once  having  decided  to  run  away,  Cotton 
forgot  everything  but  the  excitement  of  being 
out  on  a  public  highway  when  all  the  other 
boys  were  shut  inside  the  school  room,  and  he 
made  excellent  time.  His  broad  toed,  fiat 
shoes  were  well  suited  to  the  stones  and  rough 
way  of  the  Newtowne  road.  His  gray  home- 
spun suit  that  his  mother  had  made  after  the 
pattern  of  the  suits  worn  by  Master  Cheever^s 
other  Latin  class  boys  did  not  show  the  dust 
that  Cotton  kicked  up  as  he  hurried  along. 
He  knew  exactly  where  he  was  going  and  he 
was  enjoying  the  walk  hugely.  All  the  rest 
of  his  life  Cotton  was  going  to  follow  in  the 


70 AT  THE  GATE  OF  OLD  HARVARD 

footsteps  of  Increase,  his  father,  and  even 
beyond  in  the  matter  of  exhorting  the  young 
to  walk  the  straight  and  narrow  paths  of  New 
England  goodness.  But  today  he  was  a 
truant,  out  on  the  high  road  alone. 

''Good  day,  Cotton  Mather.^'  The  boy 
stopped  and  turned  to  see  one  of  his  girl 
neighbors  following  him.  She,  too,  was 
dressed  in  homespun  and  wore  a  kerchief  and 
an  apron.  She  took  a  small  packet  from  the 
bag  at  her  side  and  showed  its  contents  to 
Cotton,  explaining  why  she  was  going  his 
way.  ''It  is  the  cover  of  our  silver  tipped  jug 
that  my  father  gave  the  Harvard  College 
as  our  share  in  helping  to  pay  the  expenses 
this  year,''  she  explained.  "The  jug  is  there, 
but  he  forgot  the  cover  so  I  am  taking  it. 
They  say  there  are  many  gifts  made  to  the 
College,  pewter  plates  and  a  flock  of  sheep,  a 
silver  fruit  dish  and  sugar  spoons  and  salt 
cellars  and  some  bolts  of  cloth  that  the  ladies 
of  Boston  have  woven  to  make  coats  for  the 
students.'' 

''So  I  have  heard.  Desire  Brewster,"  Cotton 
said,  "and  the  College  has  a  goodly  library 


AT  THE  GATE  OF  OLD  HARVARD 71 

of  the  books  left  by  John  Harvard,  the  son 
of  the  London  butcher,  who  favored  learning 
so  much  that  he  gave  all  his  fortune  to  our 
College  for  which  bounty  it  is  named." 

'They  have  a  new  wooden  fence,  I  hear/' 
Desire  went  on.  Then,  looking  with  a 
puzzled  expression  at  Cotton,  she  asked. 
'Where  are  you  going,  Cotton  Mather,  during 
school  hours?'' 

''I  am  going  to  Harvard  College  at  New- 
towne,"  the  boy  answered,  ''to  have  a  look 
in  the  window  at  the  printing  press  if  I  can." 

"Oh,  Cotton!"  Desire's  cheeks  flushed.  "I 
would  never  dare  leave  school  for  that.  We 
have  no  lessons  today.  What  will  Master 
Cheever  say?" 

"I  am  not  considering  that,"  Cotton  re- 
torted, trying  to  appear  brave.  "If  you  like, 
you  may  walk  to  Newtowne  with  me.  Desire. 
I  can  probably  get  in  the  printing  room  if  I 
say  that  you  and  I  brought  the  cover  to  the 
silver  tipped  jug." 

So  the  two  went  on,  side  by  side,  past  the 
fields  of  ripening  harvest,  the  wooden  carts 
that  were  bringing  food  stuffs  from  the  farms 


72 AT  THE  GATE  OF  OLD  HARVARD 

to  Boston  and  the  glimpses  of  the  blue  sea. 
Then  the  road  turned,  and  they  met  an 
occasional  student  with  his  books  under  his 
arm.  One  was  opening  the  freshly  printed 
pages  of  a  very  slim  paper  pamphlet. 

^They  are  printing  almanacs  with  the  signs 
of  the  weather  and  instructions  about  the 
crops/'  Desire  said.  'We  are  going  to  buy 
one  to  hang  oeside  the  kitchen  clock.  The 
almanac  was  the  first  printing  done  at  Har- 
vard on  the  first  printing  press  in  America, 
was  it  not,  Cotton?'^  she  asked. 

'^No,  not  the  first.  They  struck  ofif  our 
Freeman's  Oath  at  the  first  typesetting," 
Cotton  said,  straightening  with  pride. 

Now  a  tall  picket  fence  could  be  seen  with 
a  wide  gate  and  a  lantern  above  it  at  the  edge 
of  the  road.  Behind,  as  Cotton  and  Desire 
peered  through  the  gate  could  be  seen  a  wide 
plot  of  green  grass  with  a  pump  and  surround- 
ing it,  the  rude  halls  of  our  first  college, 
wooden  buildings,  roughly  shingled,  and  clap 
boarded,  the  interiors  calked  and  daubed 
with  clay,  but  housing  a  hall  for  lectures,  a 
library,  chambers  and  study  rooms.    It  was 


AT  THE  GATE  OF  OLD  HARVARD 73 

Harvard  College,  bravely  opened  in  the  year 
1638,  and  now,  in  1674,  a  national  seat  of 
learning. 

Desire  slipped  through  the  gate,  turning  to 
explain  to  Cotton.  '^There  is  a  book  in  the 
office  in  which  the  names  of  all  those  who 
have  made  gifts  to  Harvard  are  written  down, 
with  the  objejcts  they  gave,"  she  said.  "I 
must  see  that  the  lid  of  the  jug  is  entered  in 
the  book  next  the  name  of  our  family."  She 
was  gone  then,  a  demure,  gray  gowned  little 
lass  outlined  on  the  green  campus. 

Cotton  looked  at  the  buildings  with  awe. 
He  wouldn't  have  been  tempted,  he  knew,  to 
play  truant  anywhere  but  here.  He  wanted 
to  come  to  Harvard  and  graduate;  he  knew 
almost  enough  Latin  now.  He  was  proud  to 
think  that  his  father  was  going  to  send  him  to 
college  and  he  straightened  his  shoulders  and 
put  his  hands  in  his  pockets.  His  fingers 
touched  the  lead  bullets. 

Master  Ezekial  Cheever's  bullets!  What 
would  he  say  when  he  discovered  his  basket 
gone  as  well  as  that  trusted  member  of  his 
class,   Cotton  Mather?     The  shadow  lying 


74 AT  THE  GATE  OF  OLD  HARVARD 

across  the  face  of  the  sun  dial  on  the  Harvard 
campus  showed  that  the  day  was  waning.  It 
was  not  of  such  great  consequence,  Cotton 
thought,  what  Master  Cheever  would  say 
to  him  as  what  he  would  do.  There  was  just 
about  time  to  get  through  a  good  birching 
before  supper,  he  realized,  and  there  would 
be  no  question  of  Master  Cheever's  locking 
the  school  until  he  had  administered  it. 
Cotton  started  back  with  less  haste  than  he 
had  come,  but  with  plenty  of  courage,  for 
he  was  a  Puritan  lad. 

Master  Cheever,  rod  in  hand,  stood  in  the 
schoolhouse  door  as  Cotton  returned.  He  did 
not  say  a  word  as  the  boy  gave  him  the  bul- 
lets; he  waited  for  Cotton's  explanation. 
It  came  at  last,  quite  honestly,  if  Cotton's 
voice  did  shake  a  little  in  the  telHng. 

'^I  sold  the  corn  and  beans,  sir,  and  then  I 
ran  away." 

'Where  did  you  go.  Cotton  Mather?'' 
Master  Cheever  asked  sternly. 

'1  went  to  Harvard  College,  Sir."  Cotton 
answered.  '^I  knew  my  Latin  and  my  tables, 
and  I  had  a  great  wish  to  see  the  Harvard 


AT  THE  GATE  OF  OLD  HARVARD  75 

printing  press.  I  want  to  go  to  college  as  soon 
as  I  can,  sir/' 

Master  Cheever's  rod  dropped  to  his  side 
and  he  looked  over  the  head  of  the  boy  and 
toward  the  town  hall,  remembering  something 
momentous  that  had  happened  at  a  town 
meeting  when  he  was  a  young  man.  The 
battle  with  hunger  and  hardship  had  scarcely 
been  won  in  New  England,  when  there  had 
come  the  Pilgrim's  longing  to  found  a  seat  of 
learning.  Master  Cheever  remembered  how 
the  town  of  Boston  had  appropriated  four 
hundred  pounds  in  the  year  1636,  half  of  its 
entire  income,  to  build  the  seat  of  learning 
that  was  now  Harvard  College.  That  was 
their  next  step  toward  liberty,  establishing 
freedom  from  ignorance  and  providing  for 
the  power  that  comes  to  a  people  through 
education.  Master  Cheever  was  looking 
ahead,  too.  He  saw  Cotton  Mather  leaving  his 
school  soon  and  taking  the  road  to  Harvard, 
not  as  a  truant,  but  a  student.  Why,  the  lad 
was  going  to  graduate  from  Harvard  at 
sixteen! 

Cotton  waited,  but  the  school  master  did 


76 AT  THE  GATE  OF  OLD  HARVARD 

not  pick  up  his  rod.  The  boy  wondered,  and 
then  marvelled  as  Master  Cheever's  stern  old 
face  relaxed  and  he  spoke  to  him  with  unusual 
kindness. 

^^You  may  go  this  time,  Cotton  Mather,'* 
he  said,  '^but  see  to  it  that  you  never  play 
truant  again,''  he  said. 

"Yes,  sir.  No,  I  will  not,  sir."  Cotton 
bowed  and  then  started  home.  There  was 
going  to  be  hot  hasty  pudding  with  molasses 
for  supper  he  knew,  and  after  supper  he  would 
sit  by  the  fire  and  read  the  new  almanac  his 
father  had  bought  and  plan  about  going  to 
college  before  long.  It  had  been  a  great  day, 
he  decided,  and  there  were  even  greater  ones 
to  come. 


THE  WHITE  MAN^S  FOOT 

From  his  wanderings  far  to  eastward, 
From  the  regions  of  the  morning, 
From  the  shining  land  of  Wabun, 
Homeward  now  returned  lagoo. 
The  great  traveller,  the  great  boaster, 
Fioll  of  strange  and  new  adventures, 
Marvels  many  and  many  wonders. 

And  the  people  of  the  village 
Listened  to  him  as  he  told  them 
Of  his  marvellous  adventures. 
Laughing,  answered  him  in  this  wise: 
*'Ugh!  It  is  indeed  lagoo! 
No  one  else  beholds  such  wonders!'' 

He  had  seen,  he  said,  a  water 
Bigger  than  the  Big-Sea- Water, 
Broader  than  the  Gitche  Gumee, 
Bitter  so  that  none  could  drink  it. 
At  each  other  looked  the  warriors, 


78  THE  WHITE  MAN'S  FOOT 

Looked  the  women  at  each  other, 
Smiled,  and  said,  ^^It  cannot  be  so/' 
^^Kaw,''  they  said,  ^^it  cannot  be  so!'' 

O'er  it,  said  he,  o'er  this  water 
Came  a  great  canoe  with  pinions, 
A  canoe  with  wings  came  flying. 
Bigger  than  a  grove  of  pine  trees, 
Taller  than  the  tallest  tree  tops! 
And  the  old  men  and  the  women 
Looked  and  tittered  at  each  other: 
''Kaw!"  they  said,  'Ve  don't  believe  it!" 

From  its  mouth,  he  said,  to  greet  him. 
Came  Waywassimo,  the  lightning. 
Came  the  thunder,  Annemeeke! 
And  the  warriors  and  the  women 
Looked  and  tittered  at  poor  lagoo; 
^'Kaw!"  they  said,  ^Vhat  tales  you  tell  us!" 

In  it,  said  he,  came  a  people, 
In  the  great  canoe  with  pinions 
Came,  he  said,  a  hundred  warriors. 
Painted  white  were  all  their  faces 
And  with  hair  their  chins  were  covered! 
And  the  warriors  and  the  women 


THE  WHITE  MAN'S  FOOT 79 

Laughed  and  shouted  in  derision, 
Like  the  ravens  in  the  tree  tops, 
Like  the  crows  upon  the  hemlocks. 
^^Kaw!''  they  said,  'Vhat  hes  you  tell  us! 
Do  not  think  that  we  believe  you/' 

Only  Hiawatha  laughed  not, 

But  he  gravely  spoke  and  answered 

To  their  jeering  and  their  jesting: 

*True  is  all  lagoo  tells  us; 

I  have  seen  it  in  a  vision, 

Seen  the  great  canoe  with  pinions, 

Seen  the  people  with  white  faces. 

Seen  the  coming  of  this  bearded 

People  of  the  wooden  vessel 

From  the  regions  of  the  morning. 

From  the  shining  land  of  Wabun." 

''Gitche  Manito,  the  Mighty, 
The  Great  Spirit,  the  Creator, 
Sends  them  hither  on  his  errand. 
Sends  them  to  us  with  his  message. 
Wheresoever  they  move,  before  them 
Swarms  the  stinging  fly,  the  Ahmo, 
Swarms  the  bee,  the  honey  maker; 


80 THE  WHITE  MAN'S  FOOT 

Wheresoever  they  tread,  beneath  them 
Springs  the  White-man's  Foot  in  blossom, 

**Let  us  welcome,  then,  the  strangers. 
Hail  them  as  our  friends  and  brothers, 
And  the  heart's  right  hand  of  friendship 
Give  them  when  they  come  to  see  us. 
Gitche  Manito,  the  Mighty, 
Said  this  to  me  in  my  vision. 

'*  I  beheld  too  in  that  vision 
All  the  secrets  of  the  future, 
Of  the  distant  days  that  shall  be. 
I  beheld  the  westward  marches 
Of  the  unknown,  crowded  nations. 
All  the  land  was  full  of  people. 
Restless,  struggling,  toihng,  striving. 
Speaking  many  tongues,  yet  feeling 
But  one  heart  beat  in  their  bosoms. 
In  the  woodland  rang  their  axes, 
Smoked  their  towns  in  all  the  valleys. 
Over  all  the  lakes  and  rivers 
Rushed  their  great  canoes  of  thunder. 


THE  WHITE  MAN'S  FOOT  81 

^Then  a  darker,  drearier  vision 
Passed  before  me,  vague  and  cloud-like; 
I  beheld  our  nation  scattered, 
All  forgetful  of  my  counsels, 
Weakened,  warring  with  each  other: 
Saw  the  remnants  of  our  people 
Sweeping  westward,  wild  and  woeful, 
Like  the  cloud-rack  of  a  tempest, 
Like  the  withered  leaves  in  Autumn." 


GOINGTO  LONDON  TO  VISIT  THE  KING 

There  was  a  good  deal  of  excitement  thrill- 
ing around  the  supper  table  of  the  little  house 
of  tfce  Blue  Ball  in  old  Boston.  It  was 
Josiah  Franklin^s  house,  and  the  big  blue  ball 
that  hung  over  the  doorway  indicated  that 
Mr.  Franklin  made  soap  and  candles  to  sell. 
A  dozen  or  so  Franklin  boys  and  girls,  for 
they  were  a  large  family,  sat  on  hard  wooden 
chairs  about  the  table  and  looked  over  their 
earthenware  porringers  with  wide  eyed  in- 
terest at  Ben,  their  brother.  Ben  was  going 
to  work  in  the  morning,  that  was  the  reason 
why  it  was  such  an  eventful  meal. 

Ben  had  left  school,  and  was  not  only  going 
to  peddle  newspapers  through  old  Boston's 
narrow,  crooked  lanes,  but  he  was  going  to 
help  make  almanacs  and  books  by  setting 
type  for  them  in  the  shop  where  they  were 
printed.  With  the  founding  of  schools  and 
the  introduction  of  the  printing  press  into 


GOING  TO  LONDON  TO  VISIT  THE  KING  83 

New  England  there  had  come  a  desire  among 
the  people  for  expression  as  represented  in  a 
free  press.  Quite  a  good  deal  of  printing; 
speeches,  primers,  ballads,  two  newspapers, 
and  even  hand  bills  of  one  kind  and  another 
was  being  done. 

Ben  Franklin  must  have  oeen  sixteen  years 
old,  you  decide,  and  have  taken  out  his  work- 
ing papers?  Not  a  bit  of  it!  The  plump,  red 
cheeked  little  chap  who  was  spooning  out  his 
mush  and  milk  at  the  end  of  the  supper  table 
and  trying  not  to  look  conscious  under  the 
gaze  of  the  whole  family  was  just  ten  years 
old.  He  had  left  grammar  school  when  he  was 
eight,  for  the  soap  and  candle  business  was 
not  profitable  enough  to  pay  for  more  school- 
ing than  this  in  a  family  of  such  size  as  the 
Franklin's.  Ben  was  going  to  take  his  place 
as  a  little  man  of  New  England  in  the  morn- 
ing. Even  his  spelling  book  and  his  arithmetic 
had  become  things  of  the  past. 

The  docks  and  wharves  of  Boston  were 
busy,  crowded  spots  of  interest.  Almost 
every  day  sailing  packets  from  England  or 
from  one  of  the  only  two  other  large  cities 


84  GOING  TO  LONDON  TO  VISIT  THE  KING 

of  the  New  World,  Philadelphia,  or  New 
York  anchored  there.  Trudging  to  the  print- 
ing office  of  his  older  brother,  James,  to  whom 
Ben  Franklin  was  apprenticed,  the  lad  often 
loitered  to  watch  the  billowing  sails  of  the 
ships.  Printing,  he  soon  discovered,  was  dull 
enough  work,  but  the  boys  in  the  booksellers' 
shops  where  he  delivered  papers  loaned  him 
books  to  read,  and  Ben's  favorite  book  was 
Robinson  Crusoe.  How  he  did  long  to  have  a 
voyage  and  an  adventure  as  Crusoe  had! 
Perched  on  his  high  stool  in  the  dark,  musty 
printing  room,  setting  type,  Ben  Franklin 
built  air  castles  and  dreamed  dreams.  He 
kept  on  doing  this  as  he  helped  write  and  print 
the  New  England  Courant,  his  brother's  news- 
paper, and  peddle  it  at  night,  and  run  around 
Boston  in  between  times  gathering  news  for 
the  Courant.  Each  of  Ben  Franklin's  dreams 
began  with  a  wharf  and  a  ship  and  ended  in 
England. 

Boys  have  been  longing  for  adventures  and 
wanting  to  run  away  to  find  them  ever  since 
the  world  began,  and  some  of  these  boys  have 
been  right  and  some  wrong  in  their  desire. 


GOING  TO  LONDON  TO  VISIT  THE  KING  85 

The  reason  for  Ben  Franklin^s  wanting  to  be  a 
Robinson  Crusoe  was  because  he  had  dis- 
covered that  he  was  not  free. 

A  lad  of  the  American  colonies  who  was 
going  to  be  a  ship  builder,  or  a  weaver,  or  a 
cabinet  maker,  or  a  chandler,  or  a  printer  was 
apprenticed,  just  as  a  lad  would  have  been  in 
England,  to  a  man  of  that  trade  to  learn  it. 

This  was  a  natural  enough  arrangement  in 
those  days,  and  had  not  seemed  wrong  to 
Josiah  Franklin.  Ben  was  bound  to  his 
brother  James  until  he  should  be  twenty  one 
years  old.  If  he  wanted  to  work  for  any  other 
man  or  at  any  other  trade,  his  brother  could 
prevent  it.  The  newspapers  were  full  every 
day  of  advertisements  for  runaway  appren- 
tices and  there  were  laws  for  prosecuting 
them  just  as  if  they  were  slaves.  Ben  Frank- 
lin felt  exactly  as  all  the  people  who  had  come 
to  the  New  World  felt,  and  more  strongly 
every  day,  that  no  matter  what  the  responsi- 
bilities and  consequences  were,  one  wanted 
to  be  independent. 

So  one  day,  when  he  was  seventeen  years 
old,  Ben  Franklin  ran  away  from  Boston. 


86  GOING  TO  LONDON  TO  VISIT  THE  KING 

There  were  fifteen  other  FrankUn  boys  and 
girls,  so  he  wasn't  greatly  missed  at  home, 
poor  lad.  He  sold  his  books  to  pay  for  his 
passage  in  a  leaky  boat  to  New  York.  There 
was  only  one  printer  in  New  York  then,  and 
he  had  no  work  to  offer  the  lad,  so  Ben  went 
on,  not  to  England,  but  to  Philadelphia, 
walking  fifty  miles  of  the  way,  and  reaching 
the  city  with  just  one  dollar  in  his  pocket 

Philadelphia  in  the  early  eighteenth  century 
was  a  clean,  snug,  garden  strewn  town,  its 
little  red  brick  house  made  beautiful  by  white 
colonial  doors  with  columns  and  shining  brass 
knobs.  Inside  one  saw  bright  rag  carpets  and 
polished  pewter  utensils  and  tea  sets  of 
flowing  blue  ware.  There  was  beautiful 
mahogany  furniture,  too,  made  there  in  the 
colonies  by  English  cabinet-makers;  great 
four  posted  beds,  high-boys  for  holding  the 
Unen,  corner  cabinets  for  the  pewter  platters 
and  tea  cups,  and  desks  with  carved  legs  and 
secret  drawers  for  hiding  letters.  A  post 
rider  stopped  once  in  a  while  at  the  Phila- 
delphia meeting  house  to  collect  letters  that 
he  carried  in  his  saddle  bags  to  New  York, 


GOING  TO  LONDON  TO  VISIT  THE  KING  87 

and  twice  each  week  one  could  ride  to  New 
York  in  a  stage  coach. 

As  Ben  Franklin  wandered  up  and  down 
Philadelphia's  bower  like  streets,  Walnut, 
Spruce,  Pine,  and  the  rest,  looking  at  the 
orchards  and  dairies  and  shops,  he  felt  just 
as  Philadelphia  felt  then — that  the  city  was 
quite  sufficient  to  herself  and  had  no  need  of 
England,  or  of  Ben  Franklin  either. 

In  fact  that  was  beginning  to  be  the  feeling 
in  New  York  and  Boston,  too,  as  the  New 
World  became  able  at  last  to  sit  and  sun  itself 
on  its  newly  built  doorsteps,  resting  for  a 
space  from  its  pioneer  struggles.  New  feel- 
ings of  self  sufficiency,  aloofness  and  inde- 
pendence were  in  the  air. 

Ben  Franklin,  too,  determined  to  be  able 
to  take  care  of  himself.  He  was  not  one  whit 
discouraged  at  having  to  spend  part  of  his 
last  dollar  for  rolls  which  he  ate  in  the  street. 
He  paid  out  the  rest  of  it  for  a  bed  in  a  tavern, 
and  the  next  day  he  found  work  as  a  printer. 

Philadelphia  was  growing  every  day,  and 
liked  to  read  and  know  what  was  going  on  in 
the  American  colonies  and  in  England  as 


88  GOING  TO  LONDON  TO  VISIT  THE  KING 

well.  The  colonies  were  subject  to  the  British 
Crown  and  the  King  of  England  appointed 
men  to  have  charge  of  each  colony,  but 
differences  had  already  begun  to  arise  over 
such  questions  as  shipping  and  taxation  by 
England.  It  was  like  the  head  of  a  great 
family  who  suddenly  finds  that  the  children 
have  grown  up  over  night  and  have  their  own 
ideas  and  will,  about  what  they  shall  or  shall 
not  do.  The  father  expects  the  children  to 
help  support  the  family,  and  the  children  want 
to  support  themselves  in  their  own  way.  Both 
are  right,  and  both  wrong.  So  it  was  with 
England  and  the  American  colonies. 

As  Ben  Franklin  set  type  and  started  a 
newspaper  and  opened  a  book  and  stationery 
store  and  published  a  magazine  and  printed 
his  Poor  Richard's  Almanac,  that  still  teaches 
us  honesty  and  thrift  and  industry,  he  felt 
more  and  more  as  the  American  colonists  did. 
He  had  belonged  to  a  big  family  and  had  cut 
loose  from  it;  he  had  found  out  the  hazards 
and  the  opportunities  of  such  a  course.  Some- 
times he  wished  that  he  could  go  back,  but 
that  was  not  possible:    he  had  to  work  out 


GOING  TO  LONDON  TO  VISIT  THE  KING  89 

his  freedom  just  as  the  colonies  would  have 
to  work  out  theirs. 

As  the  years  went  on,  Ben  Franklin  be- 
came Dr.  Benjamin  Franklin,  wonderfully 
well  thought  of  in  Philadelphia.  For  a  long 
time  he  wore  his  leather  apron  in  his  shop  and 
in  the  beok  store.  He  still  ate  his  breakfast 
of  bread  and  milk  with  a  pewter  spoon  from 
an  earthern  porringer,  and  he  mixed  his  own 
ink,  and  he  peddled  his  newspapers  and 
almanacs  in  a  wheelbarrow.  But  he  helped 
Philadelphia  to  have  its  first  fire  company  and 
police  force.  Then  they  made  him  postmaster 
general  of  the  Colonies  and  he  had  a  chance 
to  go  home  for  a  visit  and  also  travel  to  all 
the  principal  points  on  the  Atlantic  coast, 
helping  to  carry  and  spread  news. 

The  Leather  Apron  Club  of  Philadelphia 
interested  Benjamin  Franklin  as  much  as 
anything,  though,  partly  because  he  had 
founded  it  and  partly  because  it  had  the  first 
subscription  Ubrary  in  the  Colonies.  It  had 
been  a  kind  of  boys'  club  at  first,  started  in 
his  hard  times,  but  he  had  been  able  to  send 
to  London  for  two  hundred  books  that  the 


90  GOING  TO  LONDON  TO  VISIT  THE  KING 

Club  kept,  first,  in  the  house  of  a  member  in 
Pewter  Platter  Lane  and  then  in  the  Carpen- 
ters^ Hall  in  Philadelphia.  The  club  members 
met  there  to  read  and  to  talk.  A  great  deal  of 
the  talk  was  about  matters  in  England. 

Good  Queen  Anne  of  England  and  all  her 
children  had  died  years  before,  and  the  Eng- 
lish Crown  had  gone  to  a  certain  fussy,  hot 
tempered  German  family  from  Hanover  in 
Germany,  cousins  of  Anne's  family.  The 
earliest  Hanover  to  take  the  throne  was  King 
George  I,  who  could  not  speak  a  word  of  the 
language  of  the  land  he  had  come  to  govern, 
and  who  ruled  as  easily  as  he  could.  He  let 
his  prime  minister  select  his  cabinet  and  he 
never  attended  the  meetings,  for  he  could  not 
understand  what  was  being  said.  George  H 
liked  a  fight  and  was  eager  for  military  glory 
and  he  had  a  very  hot  temper.  It  was  said 
that  he  used  to  stamp  his  feet  and  tear  off  his 
wig  and  kick  it  when  he  fell  into  a  passion. 
Although  he  went  to  church  in  Westminster 
Abby,  he  did  not  understand  the  service  and 
used  to  talk  out  loud  in  German.  That  was 
a  poor  inheritance  for  George  IH  of  this  house 


GOING  TO  LONDON  TO  VISIT  THE  KING  91 

of  Hanover  who  took  England^s  throne  in  the 
year  1760.  He  was  only  twenty  two  years  old, 
but  he  decided  that,  no  matter  what  obstacles 
he  met,  he  would  be  king  and  England  should 
do  as  he  said,  whether  she  liked  it  or  not. 

That  was  what  Benjamin  Franklin  and  his 
friends  were  talking  and  thinking  about.  Eng- 
lish laws  now  limited  the  Colonists'  trade. 
George  III  said  that  a  stamp  bought  in 
England  must  be  placed  on  every  American 
book,  pamphlet  and  other  articles.  England 
had  to  protect  her  own  trade,  of  course,  and 
she  felt  that  these  wayfaring  children  of  hers 
over  in  the  New  World  ought  to  help  support 
their  mother  country.  Benjamin  Franklin 
could  see  both  sides  of  things,  but  he  saw, 
also,  that  this  might  be  the  beginning  of  a 
long  trouble. 

'Will  you  go  over  and  talk  to  King  George 
about  it?''  the  Leather  Apron  Club,  and 
Philadelphia,  and  at  last  all  the  Colonies 
asked  Benjamin  Franklin.  Here,  at  last,  was 
the  adventure  of  his  dreams,  and  it  had  come 
when  Benjamin  Franklin  was  an  old  man, 
sixty  years  old. 


92  GOING  TO  LONDON  TO  VISIT  THE  KING 

London  in  the  year  1766  was  just  the  kind 
of  town  that  Mother  Goose  pictures  for  us. 
In  fact  a  great  deal  of  Mother  Goose's 
nonsense  is  really  true  and  has  to  do  with  the 
odd  ways  of  kings  and  queens,  lords  and 
ladies  who  were  not  able  to  see  with  the  eyes 
of  all  the  people.  Read  her  over  again  and 
find  this  out! 

There  were  narrow  streets  in  London,  the 
upper  stories  of  the  quaint  gabled  houses 
extending  so  far  above  the  lower  ones  that 
they  almost  touched.  Smoky  oil  lanterns 
lighted  the  picture  signs  of  the  shops,  The 
Swan,  The  Golden  Fleece  and  The  Red  Lion. 
Siinple  Simon  could  be  seen  trundling  pies 
along  the  lanes  and  crying  his  wares;  and 
if  the  ladies  did  not  exactly  ride  to  Banbury 
Cross  with  bells  on  their  toes,  at  least  they 
went  in  crinolines  and  high  headdresses,  riding 
in  gilt  coaches  that  rattled  gaily  along  over 
London's  cobble  stones.  It  was  London's 
day  of; 


GOING  TO  LONDQxN  TO  VISIT  THE  KING  93 

'^Lavender  blue,  and  rosemary  green, 
I  am  the  King  and  you  are  the  Queen. 
Call  up  my  maids  at  four  o^clock. 
Some  to  the  wheel  and  some  to  the  rock, 
Some  to  make  hay,  and  some  to  shear  com; 
But  you  and  I  will  keep  ourselves  warm." 

As  Benjamin  Franklin  walked  along  the 
streets  of  London  in  his  plain  clothes,  gentle- 
men in  powdered  periwigs  and  velvet  knee 
breeches  stopped  to  take  pinches  of  snuff  from 
their  gold  snuff-boxes — ^but  really  to  smile  at 
this  plain  old  man  from  the  American 
Colonies.  He  was  thinking  too  busily,  though, 
to  notice  them.  He  was  realizing  how  very 
different  from  each  other  the  two  Englands, 
the  Old  and  the  New,  had  grown.  He  was 
wondering,  too,  what  King  George  would  say 
to  him.  But  after  all  King  George  told  his 
ministers  what  to  say  to  this  old  printer  who 
had  come  to  England  to  barter  with  a  royal 
will.  It  was  the  King^s  Parliament,  not  the 
King  himself,  that  .Benjamin  Franklin  had  to 
face. 

Fancy  an  old,  dim  room  in  stately  West- 


94  GOING  TO  LONDON  TO  VISIT  THE  KING 

minster  Hall,  built  in  the  days  of  the  Norman 
kings.  It  was  a  kind  of  great  court  room,  and 
filled  with  the  lords  of  the  court  of  this  Hano- 
verian ruler  of  England,  a  few  of  them  able 
to  see  the  desires  and  needs  of  the  Colonies, 
the  majority  realizing  England^s  need  of 
helping  to  support  herself  through  restricted 
trade  with,  and  taxes  levied  on  her  American 
Colonists.  Last  of  all,  fancy  Benjamin 
Franklin  standing  before  these  representatives 
of  George  III  for  many  days,  our  first  Ameri- 
can diplomatist,  and  trying  to  help  them  to 
see,  as  he  did,  both  sides  of  the  question. 

^'How  does  America  feel  toward  England?*' 
they  asked  Benjamin  Franklin. 

^'We  not  only  love,  but  we  respect  her," 
he  repUed. 

^'Will  the  Americans  pay  the  stamp  duty 
if  it  is  moderated?'^  they  asked  next. 

"Never!"  he  told  them. 

''Are  you  not  obliged  to  buy  the  articles  we 
manufacture?"  they  queried. 

''We  may  wear  English  cloth  now," 
Benjamin  Franklin  answered,  "but  when  our 


Before  the  representatives  of  George  III,  stood 
Benjamin  Franklin,  our  first  American 
Diplomatist. 


GOING  TO  LONDON  TO  VISIT  THE  KING  95 

old  clothes  are  worn  out,  we  will  weave  the 
cloth  for  our  new  ones." 

*^You  will  not  have  wool  enough/'  they 
told  him. 

"We  are  going  to  use  no  more  lambs  for 
food/'  Benjamin  Franklin  said  to  this,  "and 
in  every  one  of  our  houses  stands  a  spinning 
wheel.'' 

Then  King  George's  ministers  tried  another 
argument. 

"If  we  repeal  the  stamp  act,  will  the 
colonies  acknowledge  that  the  English  Crown 
has  a  right  to  tax  them?"  they  asked. 

"Never/'  was  Benjamin  Franklin's  sure 
reply. 

So  there  the  matter  stood.  The  old 
and  the  new  England  could  not  seem  to  un- 
derstand each  other. 

Through  Benjamin  Franklin's  diplomacy 
the  stamp  act  was  repealed.  He  went  home 
to  see  the  colonies  all  ablaze  with  bonfires 
and  hear  the  church  bells  from  Boston  to 
Philadelphia  ringing  for  joy  at  what  he  had 
accomplished  for  liberty.  But  the  repeal  of 
the  stamp  act  meant  that  England  had  need 


96  GOING  TO  LONDON  TO  VISIT  THE  KING 

of  providing  some  other  form  of  revenue.  A 
tax  on  tea  was  proposed,  and  the  tea  pot  of 
the  colonists'  wrath  boiled  over  at  this  levy. 

There  was  no  way  out  of  it  all  except 
through  a  fair  fight.  England  needed  the 
American  colonists  as  her  apprentices,  and 
the  colonists,  themselves,  wanted  to  learn 
their  trade  of  freedom  alone,  and  in  their  own 
way.  Back  of  it  all  was  the  despotic  will  of  a 
stubborn,  short-sighted  King.  Benjamin 
Franklin  saw  the  beginning  of  it  and  he  was 
there,  too,  at  the  end  of  the  fight,  for  America 
was  on  the  verge  of  lighting  the  torches  of 
her  Revolution. 


RINGING  IN  THE  FOURTH  OF  JULY 

The  bell-ringer  of  the  statehouse  in  Phila- 
delphia was  growing  old,  and  once  in  awhile 
his  little  grandson  climbed  the  stairs  to  the 
belfry  and  pulled  the  bell  rope  to  help  him. 
It  was  a  long  dark  way  up  the  dusty  stair- 
case and  the  lad  always  went  as  quietly  as  his 
copper-toed  shoes  would  let  him,  partly  so  as 
not  to  surprise  the  mice  and  bats  into  coming 
down  to  meet  him,  and  partly  to  avoid  dis- 
turbing the  great  men  of  the  country  who 
met  in  the  assembly  room  of  the  statehouse. 

They  were  the  important  statesmen  of  the 
American  Colonies,  old  Dr.  Benjamin  Frank- 
lin, who  could  accomplish  almost  anything 
from  printing  an  almanac  to  catching  light- 
ning, Mr.  Thomas  Jefferson  who  was  looked 
up  to  as  the  wise  scribe  of  the  Colonies. 
His  desk  in  the  statehouse  was  so  covered 
with  quill  pens  and  papers  and  red  seals  that 
the  lad  scarcely  dared  to  dust  it.  There  was 


98  RINGING  IN  THE  FOURTH  OF  JULY 

Mr.  John  Adams  of  Massachusetts,  also,  who 
had  seen  a  shipload  of  bales  of  tea  turned 
overboard  in  Boston  Harbor  three  years 
before  because  the  Colonists  refused  to  pay 
a  tax  on  it  to  King  George  III  of  England* 
John  Adams  loved  a  cup  of  fragrant  tea 
served  in  Boston's  blue  and  white  china,  but 
he  loved  his  country  more. 

On  his  way  up  toward  the  belfry  stairs, 
the  bell-ringer's  grandson  peeped  in  the  door 
at  these  men  and  those  others  with  them  in 
knee  breeches,  silver  buckled  shoes,  and 
powdered  hair  that  was  worn  by  some  in 
braided  queues.  They  were  the  members  of 
the  first  American  Congress,  and  their  talk 
was  of  the  Colonies  they  represented,  stretch- 
ing now  from  Maine  to  Georgia;  what  was 
best  for  them  in  the  way  of  government  that 
the  people  might  be  free,  and  yet  united.  The 
idea  had  already  come  to  this  first  body  of 
law  makers  that  laws  should  not  be  made  to 
limit  a  man's  freedom,  but  to  give  men  new 
liberty  to  live  and  work  and  think  by  freeing 
them  from  wrong  doing,  lawlessness,  and 
crime. 


RINGING  IN  THE  FOURTH  OF  JULY 99 

This  matter  of  governing  a  new  nation  was 
becoming  increasingly  important.  The  Con- 
gress reaHzed  that,  and  so  it  was  sitting  in  the 
statehouse  of  old  Philadelphia  on  a  very 
warm  summer  afternoon,  the  fourth  of  July 
in  the  year  1776. 

The  lad  turned  away  from  the  door.  Per- 
haps it  would  be  better  not  to  ring  the  bell 
for  sunset  because  the  Congress  was  sitting 
so  late,  he  decided.  His  grandfather  was  up 
in  the  belfry  polishing  the  bell,  and  he  would 
wait  and  go  up  when  the  gentlemen  of  the 
Congress  started  home.  The  boy  stood  a 
little  while  in  the  doorway  of  the  brick  build- 
ing and  looked  down  Chestnut  Street  on  which 
it  stood 

There  came  the  post  rider,  his  mail  pouches 
gray  with  dust,  and  his  horse's  hoofs  strilc- 
ing  sparks  on  the  paving  stones  in  the  warm, 
gathering  twilight.  What  an  adventuresome 
life  a  post  rider's  was,  the  lad  thought  envi- 
ously. They  rode  between  all  the  cities  of  the 
new  nation,  meeting  at  the  borders  of  the 
Colonies  to  exchange  and  carry  on  letters  and 
packets. 


100 RINGING  IN  THE  FOURTH  OF  JULY 

The  post  riders  were  making  and  living  the 
geography  of  the  American  Colonies  which 
were  too  young  and  were  growing  up  too  fast 
to  be  between  book  covers  or  on  maps  yet  in 
the  schools.  They  rode  to  the  green  pasture 
land  of  New  Hampshire,  heard  the  whir  of 
spinning  wheels  in  Connecticut  and  passed 
the  gate  of  Harvard  College  in  Boston.  They 
talked  to  the  fishermen  of  Rhode  Island  and 
the  trappers  of  New  York;  stopped  for 
foaming  mugs  of  milk  in  some  dairy  of  New 
Jersey  or  Pennsylvania,  passed  fertile  farms 
of  Delaware  and  Maryland,  had  supper  of 
hot  corn  bread  and  ham  on  a  rich  Virginia 
tobacco  plantation,  and  rode  past  white 
cotton  fields  in  the  Carolinas  or  Georgia. 
Thirteen  thriving,  growing,  alert  American 
Colonies,  alike  in  their  desire  for  liberty,  and 
different  in  their  settlement,  people,  work, 
products  and  mode  of  thinking.  But  they 
were  keeping  together  after  a  fashion,  for  they 
all  sent  delegates  to  the  Continental  Congress 
here  in  Philadelphia,  and  they  were  united 
at  heart  in  a  league  of  neighborly  friendship 
and  for  common  defense. 


RINGING  IN  THE  FOURTH  OF  JULY  Ipl: 

The  post  rider  was  gone  now.  The  la,ti  ipi 
the  door  of  the  statehouse  could  see  nothing 
but  a  cloud  of  gray  dust  up  Chestnut  Street 
where  he  had  been.  It  was  the  quiet,  dim  end 
of  a  sultry  day  and  the  street  was  empty,  for 
the  early  supper  tables  would  soon  be  laid. 
At  least  Chestnut  Street  had  been  empty. 
Now  the  boy  saw  that  it  was  suddenly  begin- 
ning to  fill.  Housewives  who  had  neglected 
to  take  off  their  cooking  aprons,  shop  keepers 
with  their  tape  measures  still  dangling  over 
their  shoulders,  a  raw  recruit  of  a  soldier  who 
held  his  musket  awkwardly  because  his  hands 
were  more  used  to  a  spade,  a  barrister  in  a 
long  black  robe  and  huge  wig,  even  the  post 
rider  returned,  all  these  and  more  moved 
toward  the  stately  old  building  that  housed 
the  Congress.  What  could  it  mean,  the  bell 
ringer's  grandson  wondered,  shrinking  back 
into  the  shadow  of  the  doorway? 

As  he  waited,  the  door  of  the  assembly  room 
opened,  and  he  saw  that  Mr.  Thomas  Jefferson 
held  a  very  long  and  important  looking 
document  in  his  hand  from  which  he  was 
reading  in  his  strong,  clear  voice.    The  boy 


,  ;  :   A02  RINGING  IN  THE  FOURTH  OF  JULY 

.  "^  V  c^iiid  catch  some  of  the  words,  and  so  could 
that  part  of  the  crowd  outside  nearest  the 
open  windows: 

^^When,  in  the  course  of  human  events,  it 
becomes  necessary  for  one  people  to  dissolve 
the  political  bands  which  have  connected 
them  with  another,  and  to  assume,  among 
the  powers  of  the  earth,  the  separate  and 
equal  station  to  which  the  laws  of  nature  and 
of  nature's  God  entitle  them — "  Mr.  Jefiferson 
read.    He  went  on: — 

"We,  therefore,  the  representatives  of  the 
United  States  of  America  in  general  Congress 
assembled,  appealing  to  the  Supreme  Judge 
of  the  world  for  the  rectitude  of  our  inten- 
tions, do,  in  the  name,  and  by  authority  of 
the  good  people  of  these  colonies,  solemnly 
publish  and  declare,  that  these  United 
Colonies  are,  and  of  right  ought  to  be  free 
and  independent  states.'' 

That  was  the  word  that  held  the  crowd 
breathless,  "independent." 

Then  Mr.  Jefferson  finished: — 

"That  as  free  and  independent  States,  they 
have  full  power  to  levy  war,  conclude  peace, 


RINGING  IN  TPIE  FOURTH  OF  JULY 103 

contract  alliances,  establish  commerce,  and 
to  do  all  other  acts  and  things  which  inde- 
pendent States  may  do.  And,  for  the  support 
of  this  declaration,  with  a  firm  reliance  on  the 
protection  of  Divine  Providence,  we  mutually 
pledge  to  each  other  our  lives,  our  fortunes, 
and  our  sacred  honor/' 

There  was  a  silence  of  only  a  second.  Then 
the  ayes  of  the  Congress,  pledging  the  new 
nation's  support  to  this  declaration  of  inde- 
pendence filled  the  room,  and  resounded  in  the 
street  and  re-echoed  from  the  crowd,  mingling 
with  their  cheers. 

•''Ring    the  bell  for  freedom!''   some  one 
shouted. 

Now  his  chance  had  come  to  celebrate  the 
fourth  of  July,  1776,  the  bell  ringer's  grandson 
knew,  and  he  ran  up  the  stairs  to  the  belfry, 
kicking  up  almost  as  much  dust  as  the  post 
rider  and  not  one  whit  afraid  of  the  scurrying 
mice  and  the  flapping  winged  bats. 

^^Ring  the  bell,  grandfather,"  he  cried, 
'^Ring  it,  the  Congress  and  the  people  say,  for 
freedom!" 

Taking  hold  of  the  rope,  the  lad  pulled  too. 


104  RINGING  IN  THE  FOURTH  OF  JULY 

helping  his  grandfather  with  all  his  might  as 
peal  after  peal  rang  out  through  the  summer 
evening  and  was  the  signal  for  more  shouts 
of  joy  in  the  street  and  the  pealing  of  every 
other  bell  in  old  Philadelphia. 

There  are  Christmas  bells  that  chime  for 
peace,  and  church  bells  that  call  us  to  think 
of  holy  things,  the  jester  jingles  his  bells  for 
mirth,  and  the  sheep  bells  tinkling  along 
country  lanes  at  sunset  tell  us  of  the  plenty 
and  comfort  of  the  farm.  But  the  ringing  of 
the  Liberty  Bell  on  that  first  fourth  of  July 
held  the  message  of  all  these  others.  It 
sounded  the  desire  for  a  day  when  wars  would 
not  be  needed.  It  rang  for  religious  and  civil 
liberty,  for  the  right  to  enjoy  play  and  work 
without  autocratic  interference,  and  for  free- 
dom to  develop  and  enjoy  all  the  prosperity 
that  the  fertile  earth  offered.  So  it  rings  to- 
day, and  will  always  ring  in  the  hearts  of  free 
peoples. 

It  was  a  very  fine  way  of  celebrating  a  great 
day,  and  particularly  for  the  lad  who  was 
able  to  have  a  part  in  it.  No  one  thought 
about  wasting  money  on  fire  crackers  or  pop- 


RINGING  IN  THE  FOURTH  OF  JULY 105 

guns,  or  rockets,  for  the  people  of  the  Colonies 
saw  a  long  road  ahead  of  them  before  they 
should  be  able  to  work  out  their  independence. 
The  call  of  the  Liberty  Bell  was  all  the 
celebration  they  wanted  or  needed  to  start 
them  along  that  road.  The  next  year,  though, 
saw  them  holding  our  flag.  The  Congress  had 
adopted  one,  thirteen  broad  red  and  white 
stripes,  and  thirteen  white  stars,  circled  in  a 
blue  field,  for  the  thirteen  original  American 
colonies,  and  waving  for  freedom. 


KEEPING  CHRISTMAS  WITH 
GENERAL  WASHINGTON 

A  Christmas  tree,  with  shining  candles  and 
a  gold  star  set  on  the  topmost  branch!  The 
sentinel  in  the  worn  uniform  of  the  Conti- 
nental Army  could  see  it  quite  plainly  there 
in  front  of  him  as  he  paced  the  picket  line  of 
the  camp  on  the  Delaware  through  the  cold 
and  the  driving  snow.  Then  he  pulled  his 
worn  cape  closer  around  his  bowed  shoulders 
and  quickened  his  pace.  He  was  almost 
freezing,  he  realized  that  now.  Numb  from 
head  to  foot,  he  had  a  strange,  dream-like 
kind  of  feeling,  and  the  Christmas  tree  that 
he  had  thought  he  saw  was  part  of  a  dream. 
It  was  a  pine  tree  growing  on  the  bleak  bank 
of  the  river,  hung  with  icicles,  its  branches 
creaking  in  the  winter  wind,  and  a  lonely  star 
shining  down  through  a  cloud  upon  it. 

Christmas  night  in  his  home  in  Virginia! 
The  sentinel  could  see  his  house  there  at  the 


CHRISTMAS  WITH  GENERAL  WASHINGTON  107 

end  of  the  road,  the  light  in  the  window  mak- 
ing a  bright  path  leading  toward  him  across 
the  snow.  It  was  a  comfortable  farmhouse, 
surrounded  by  rich  pasture  land  and  tobacco 
fields  and  orchards.  There  were  horses  and 
dogs  without  number  in  the  stables  and  the 
storehouse  was  hung  with  hams  and  sides  of 
bacon  and  freshly  killed  fowl  for  the  holiday 
feasting.  All  the  family,  his  brothers,  his 
mother  and  his  father  were  gathered  about 
the  great  log  fire  in  the  living  room,  keeping 
Christmas  together.  How  warm  and  com- 
fortable it  was! 

No,  this  was  just  another  dream,  the 
sentinel  understood,  as  he  stamped  on  the 
frozen  snow  and  swung  his  arms  to  fight  the 
stupor  of  the  cold  that  had  again  crept  over 
him.  The  light  he  saw  shone  through  the 
chinks  in  one  of  the  rude  log  huts  of  the  army 
camp.  There  were  other  huts  scattered 
along  the  new  roads  for  holding  this  depleted 
remnant  of  the  Continental  troops  who  were 
fighting  for  the  liberty  of  the  American 
colonies.  The  soldiers  had  chopped  down 
trees  from  the  neighboring  hillsides  for  build- 


108  CHRISTMAS  WITH  GENERAL  WASHINGTON 

ing  their  shelters  and  had  put  up  the  huts 
that  December,  with  the  wdnter  upon  them. 
They  had  worked  in  storms,  the  wind  biting 
through  their  threadbare  clothing,  and  with 
no  food  except  flour  mixed  with  water  and 
baked  in  the  coals  of  an  outdoor  fire,  a  strip 
of  tough  beef  once  in  a  while,  or  a  tin  of  stale 
fish. 

The  sentinel  himself  was  crowded  with 
many  other  soldiers  in  the  cabin  whose  light 
he  had  mistaken  for  home  candles.  There 
was  no  floor  except  the  frozen  earth  and  not 
even  straw  enough  to  make  beds  for  all  the 
men.  They  had  only  pieces  of  worn  blankets 
left  and  it  bade  fair  to  be  a  bitter  winter. 
The  beggared  camp  at  McConkey^s  Ferry  was 
his  only  home  this  Christmas  night.  His 
father  and  brothers  had  been  killed  in  the 
first  year  of  the  American  Revolution;  his 
Christmas  company  was  the  valiant  fellow- 
ship of  an  undaunted  army  of  farmers, 
blacksmiths,  teachers,  shop  keepers,  printers, 
preachers,  one  and  all  men  of  the  Colonies  who 
had  voluntarily  given  up  their  peaceful  trades 
and  their  homes  for  freedom's  sake.    They  had 


CHRISTMAS  WITH  GENERAL  WASHINGTON  109 

shouldered  muskets,  and  followed  the  torch 
that,  lighted  on  Bunker  Hill  in  1775,  had 
kindled  the  watch  fires  of  the  new  nation  from 
the  north  to  the  south. 

Were  those  holly  berries  from  his  Virginia 
woods,  the  sentinel  w^ondered,  that  lay  so  red 
in  the  snow  at  his  feet?  He  stopped  a  moment 
to  look.  Then  he  gripped  his  musket  and 
smiled  grimly  as  he  forced  himself  to  hasten 
his  march.  They  were  drops  of  blood  from 
his  feet,  for  the  frozen  stubble  had  cut  through 
his  ragged  soles,  but  what  did  that  matter,  he 
thought?  All  the  Colonies  were  shedding 
their  blood  in  a  plucky  fight  for  freedom. 

There  had  been  ups  and  downs  so  far  for  the 
Continental  Army,  mainly  defeats  of  late. 
King  George  IH  of  England  had  not  been 
able  to  spare  enough  English  troops  to  send 
to  America,  and  so  he  had  hired  soldiers  from 
certain  states  in  Germany  that  w^ere  known  as 
the  Hesses.  These  German  soldiers  were 
called  Hessians  and  they  had  sailed  into  New 
York  harbor  in  1776,  thousands  strong,  to 
reinforce  the  English  troops  of  Sir  William 
Howe.     More  and  still  more  Hessians  came 


no  CHRISTMAS  WITH  GENERAL  WASHINGTON 

until  they  swelled  the  forces  of  the  enemy  to 
the  number  of  almost  thirty  thousand  men, 
and  the  Continental  Army  had  only  a  scant 
ten  thousand  left.  This  invading  army  under 
General  Howe  had  sailed  down  from  New 
York  City  to  Philadelphia,  unchecked  all  the 
way,  and  now  occupied  Philadelphia  which 
had  grown  to  be  America's  largest  city. 

A  terrible  winter  season  was  on  its  way. 
The  army  of  invasion  was  comfortably  housed 
for  cold  weather  in  Philadelphia  with  plenty  of 
food  and  stores  of  ammunition.  The  camp 
across  the  Deleware  close  at  hand  and  natural- 
ly defended  by  the  hills,  had  been  built  to  meet 
Howe  by  a  brave  handful  of  the  Colonials. 
If  they  could  prevent  the  enemy  from  com- 
municating with  New  York  until  spring,  if 
they  did  not  starve  before  then,  they  might 
see  hope.  But  they  were  less  than  three 
thousand  strong,  ragged,  cold,  and  half 
famished.  They  faced  the  worst  odds  of  the 
whole  Revolution. 

Picket  duty  in  the  Revolution  was  one  of 
the  most  important  kinds  of  soldiering,  and 
the  hardest.     Half  clad,  shivering  with  the 


CHRISTMAS  WITH  GENERAL  WASHINGTON  1 1 1 

bitter  cold,  and  with  the  driving  snow  wrap- 
ping him  like  a  garment,  the  sentinel  paced 
back  and  forth.  It  was  a  duty  that  had  to  be 
done.  General  Howe  was  likely  to  move  out 
from  Philadelphia  and  attack  at  any  moment; 
there  were  spies  about,  waiting  for  an  op- 
portunity to  slip  into  the  headquarters  of  the 
Continentals  in  the  stolen  uniform  of  a 
Continental  soldier  and  take  back  information 
to  the  enemy.  There  had  been  spies  who  had 
tried  to  stir  up  a  mutiny  among  the  war  worn 
troops  of  the  Colonies.  Shifting  his  musket 
from  one  shoulder  to  the  other  that  his  hands 
might  not  freeze  to  the  steel,  the  sentinel 
remembered  the  trouble  these  spies  of  the 
king  had  made.  He  repeated  to  himself  what 
his  own  hut  mates  had  said  to  him: 

^'What  is  the  use  of  going  on?"  they  had 
asked.  ^'It  is  a  losing  fight  and  the  odds  are 
against  us.  We  are  new  at  soldiering  and  the 
troops  that  have  been  sent  from  England  to 
defeat  us  have  been  trained  for  years." 

They  had  made  other  whispered  complaints 
also. 

"Why  doesn't  the  Continental   Congress 


1 12  CHRISTMAS  WITH  GENERAL  WASHINGTON 

send  us  food  and  blankets  and  overcoats  and 
shoes?  We  could  perhaps  get  home  to  a  fire 
and  a  warm  pot  of  porridge  if  we  slipped 
through  the  lines.  It's  not  many  miles  to 
Philadelphia  and  the  Hessians  would  only 
wink  at  us,  or  help  us  on  our  way/' 

There  is  nothing  like  cold  and  hunger  for 
taking  the  courage  out  of  a  man's  heart;  the 
lonely  sentinel  knew  that  all  too  well.  His 
back  bent  to  meet  the  blast  of  a  savage, 
driving  north-easter  that  had  just  sprung  up. 
It  seemed  as  if  he  could  not  straighten  his 
hunched  figure  to  lift  his  musket  again. 
Suppose  he  were  to  drop  his  gun  there  in  the 
snow?  Would  his  broken  shoes  take  him 
those  twenty  miles  to  Philadelphia?  But  a 
whirling  gust  of  the  gale  made  a  little  opening 
in  the  white  curtain  of  the  snow  that  hung  in 
front  of  him,  and  the  sentinel  suddenly  drew 
himself  up  to  his  full  height,  looking  through. 
His  eyes  were  not  playing  him  tricks  this 
time.  It  was  not  a  dream  he  saw,  but  the 
reality  of  this  Christmas  night. 

An  open  boat,  with  the  red,  white  and  blue 
colors  of  the  Colonies  whipped  by  the  wind 


CHRISTMAS  WITH  GENERAL  WASHINGTON  1 13 

at  its  bow  rocked  on  the  bank  of  the  river, 
with  thick  blocks  of  ice  floating  near  and 
threatening  to  crush  it.  Facing  it  at  the 
edge  of  the  icy,  foaming  stream  was  the  tall 
figure  of  a  man  who  the  sentinel  knew  and 
loved,  as  did  every  soldier  in  the  Continental 
Army  know  and  love  him.  He  was  erect  and 
stalwart  as  he  stood  there  looking  across  the 
Delaware  River  through  the  storm.  His 
three  cornered  hat,  with  its  tri-colored  cockade 
of  Hberty  in  front  was  pushed  back,  showing 
his  high  forehead  and  his  thick  brown  hair. 
In  spite  of  the  lines  of  discouragement  in  his 
face  his  eyes  were  clear  and  bright  with  hope. 
His  cloak,  blown  open  in  the  gale,  showed  his 
blue  and  buff  uniform  of  the  Colonies.  He 
was  a  strong,  healthy,  courageous  looking 
man  and  the  sentinel,  seeing  him,  took  new 
courage  also. 

He  was  the  commanding  officer  of  the 
Continental  Army  and  had  more  to  bear  that 
Christmas  night,  the  sentinel  knew,  than  his 
men.  He,  too,  was  away  from  the  fireside 
of  his  home  on  a  Virginia  plantation.  He  had 
given  up  the  quiet  farming  life  he  loved,  his 


lU  CHRISTMAS  WITH  GEN'ER,\L  WASHINGTON 

comfort,  ease,  and  wealth  because  he  could  not 
keep  these  and  do  his  duty  to  his  country  too. 
The  sentinel  knew  what  this  officer  was 
thinking: 

^^Xot  one  of  my  men  suffers  and  dies,  but 
it  is  my  suffering  and  my  responsibihty.  I 
am  carn^^ing  all  they  are  and  more,  for  the 
whole  w^eight  of  the  American  Revolution  is 
my  burden.  I  am  almost  overpowered.  I 
must  face  ten  times  my  number  of  soldiers 
with  a  handful  of  ragged,  tired,  poorly  armed 
troops.  It  is  a  trust  too  great  for  my  capacity, 
but  it  has  been  a  kind  of  destiny  that  has  been 
thrown  upon  me,  and  it  was  utterh"  out  of  my 
power  to  refuse   it.'^ 

The  sentinel  watched,  straining  his  eyes 
to  see  his  general's  shghtest  move.  Suddenly 
he  saw  him  pull  the  boat  closer  to  shore  and 
step  into  it,  taking  his  place  beside  the  colors 
that  floated  at  the  bow.  Following  him,  from 
the  huts  of  Valley  Forge,  a  line  of  ragged 
soldiers  made  their  way  through  the  storm 
with  their  muskets  over  their  shoulders  and 
took  their  places  silently  in  the  boat. 

George  Washington,  commander-in-chief  of 


CHRISTMAS  WITH  GENERAL  WASHINGTON  115 

the  Continental  troops,  had  decided  to  take 
the  greatest  hazard  of  the  entire  Revolution. 
He  was  going  to  try  and  cross  the  half  frozen 
Delaware  in  an  ice  storm  with  a  handful  of 
weakened  men  and  surprise  the  Hessians' 
first  line  of  defense  at  Trenton. 

The  sentineFs  hour  of  picket  duty  was 
ended  and  with  it  came  an  end  to  his  doubts 
and  discouragement.  That  was  always  the 
effect  of  General  Washington's  presence  upon 
his  men.  They  knew  that  he  never  weakened, 
never  gave  up  struggling,  and  his  defeats  only 
spurred  him  on  to  an  ultimate  victory.  He 
had  taken  command  of  the  undisciplined, 
untrained  men  of  the  Colonies  in  1775  whose 
only  hope  was  their  patriotism  and  determina- 
tion, and  he  had  made  them  into  an  army  that 
King  George  was  beginning  to  worry  about 
in  spite  of  his  own  picked  regiments  sent  to 
defeat  it.  The  sentinel  knew  that  he  could 
be  one  of  these  Revolutionary  heroes  under 
the  leadership  of  General  Washington. 

Instead  of  finding,  as  he  might  have,  the 
poor  fire  in  his  hut  in  camp,  he  stumbled 
through  the  snow  drifts  and  the  cutting  sleet 


116  CHRISTMAS  WITH  GENERAL  WASHINGTON 

toward  the  river.  There  were  other  boats 
filling  fast  and  noiselessly  with  Washington's 
men.  The  sentinel  could  find  his  w^ay  to  them 
by  the  blood  stains  along  the  snow,  left  by 
the  torn  feet  of  his  fellow  soldiers.  It  was 
Christmas  night,  the  night  when  hope  for 
the  whole  earth  was  born  to  men,  and  peace 
was  offered  to  the  world.  The  men  of 
Washington's  command  with  this  high  hope 
in  their  hearts  were  going  to  keep  Christmas 
by  trying  to  bring  again  that  peace  which 
their  country  had  lost. 

The  valiant  little  expedition  under  General 
Washington's  intrepid  leadership  crossed  the 
river  from  the  Pennsylvania  side  during  the 
worst  storm  of  the  winter.  They  were  to  be 
met  by  troops  from  Philadelphia  and  from 
Bristol  who  would  reinforce  them  sufficiently 
to  make  possible  an  attack  upon  the  Hessians. 
But  the  Delaware  was  a  floating  mass  of 
cakes  of  ice,  some  of  Washington's  men  were 
frozen  to  death  in  crossing,  and  the  rein- 
forcements failed  him.  But  early  on  the 
following  momLQg  the  half  frozen,  half  armed 
Continentals  attacked  the  Hessian  front  line 


CHRISTMAS  WITH  GENERAL  WASHINGTON  117 

at  Trenton,  drove  in  their  pickets,  surrounded 
the  camp,  fought  their  way  through  the  town, 
completely  surprising  the  enemy^  and  re- 
crossed  the  Delaware  River  with  a  thousand 
prisoners. 

It  was  a  turning  point  of  the  Revolution, 
an  unprecedented  piece  of  bravery  on  the 
part  of  General  Washington  and  his  half  de- 
feated army  that  put  new  life  into  the  cause 
of  Hberty.  It  set  King  George  and  his  fol- 
lowers to  thinking,  and  more  and  still  more 
English  statesmen  were  won  over  to  the 
cause  of  these  struggling  brothers  of  theirs  on 
the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic. 

The  Christmas  snows  of  the  camp  melted, 
and  the  ground  was  warm  once  more  and 
bright  with  grass  and  wild  flowers.  The 
French  nation,  which  has  always  loved  inde- 
pendence, helped  the  Colonies  by  lending 
them  money  and  sending  them  supplies.  A 
young  French  nobleman,  the  Marquis  de 
Lafayette,  scarcely  older  than  a  boy,  organized 
a  relief  expedition  and  ran  away  to  America 
to  help  General  Washington  in  his  later 
campaigns. 


1 18  CHRISTMAS  WITH  GENERAL  WASHINGTON 

There  came  a  day  when  Lord  CornwaUis 
and  his  British  army  of  many  thousands  of 
men  were  penned  up  in  Yorktown  in  Virginia, 
and  on  the  nineteenth  of  October  in  1781 
he  made  a  brave  surrender  to  General  Wash- 
ington. 

That  was  the  end  of  our  Revolution.  Eng- 
land recognized  the  freedom  of  the  United 
States  and  on  the  third  of  September  1783 
a  treaty  of  peace  between  Great  Britain  and 
the  United  States  of  America  was  signed  at 
Versailles  in  France.  It  had  been  a  fair  fight, 
but  King  George  had  not  been  able  to  get  men 
to  serve  in  an  army  of  invasion ,  and  the  people 
and  parliament  supported  the  war  only  half 
heartedly.  For  a  great  many  years  we  have 
spoken  of  the  American  Revolution  as  our 
war  with  England  for  independence.  It  was 
more  than  that.  It  was  our  struggle  for  a 
recognition  of  the  rights  of  English  folk  in 
America,  and  other  peoples  everywhere  for 
that  matter,  as  opposed  to  the  autocracy  of  a 
self  willed,  ambitious  German  King. 


THE  GHOST  THAT  HAUNTED  WALL 
STREET 

There  had  never,  before,  been  such  a  crowd 
along  Wall  Street  in  New  York  as  there  was 
that  last  day  of  April  in  the  year  1789.  It 
filled  the  road  and  banked  the  sidewalks  and 
was  thickest  in  front  of  the  Federal  Hall, 
women  in  their  best  bonnets  and  little  girls 
in  hoop  skirts  and  flowered  frocks,  men  wear- 
ing tall  hats  and  boys  in  odd  little  round  caps 
and  very  long  trousers.  They  all  pushed  their 
way  closer  and  kept  their  eyes  fixed  on  the 
balcony  of  this  old  Federal  building  as  if  they 
expected  to  see  someone  of  importance  there. 

The  Stars  and  Stripes  floated  everywhere, 
the  colors  on  all  the  buildings  showing  brightly 
against  the  blue  of  the  water  just  the  other 
side  of  the  wall  that  protected  the  street  from 
tides.  The  people  who  carried  our  flag,  many 
■of  whom  had  traveled  by  carriage  for  this  great 
occasion  from  as  far  north  as  Massachusetts 


120      THE  GHOST  THAT  HAUNTED  WALL  STREET 

and  as  far  south  as  Virginia,  waved  it  with  a 
new  p^nd  personal  kind  of  pride.  Two  years 
before  a  body  of  the  leading  men  of  the 
Colonies  had  met  in  convention  at  Phil- 
delpiiia  and  had  framed  a  constitution  and 
decided  that,  since  peace  had  come,  the 
Colonies  needed  a  closer  relationship  for 
mutual  help  and  growth.  So  they  were  now 
the  United  States  with  a  Congress  of  two 
branches,  one  to  be  made  up  of  men  elected 
by  the  people  and  the  other  from  names 
suggested  by  the  states'  own  bodies  of  law 
makers,  the  legislatures.  It  seemed  like  a  fair 
plan  of  government  for  our  new  nation, 
standing  alone  at  last.  The  people  believed 
in  it;  that  was  why  their  eyes  were  on  the 
balcony  of  the  Federal  Hall  in  Wall  Street. 
As  they  watched,  a  man  stepped  out  and 
faced  them.  He  wore  a  plain  suit  of  brown 
cloth  that  had  been  spun,  woven  and  cut  in 
his  native  state  of  Virginia,  and  the  metal 
buttons  on  the  coat  were  stamped  with 
eagles,  our  new  emblem  of  liberty.  As  this 
man  leaned  forward  to  speak  to  the  people, 


THE  GHOST  THAT  HAUNTED  WALL  STREET       121 

a  great  shout  as  from  one  voice  went  up  from 
the  street  below. 

*Tresident  Washington!  Our  General  and 
leader,  George  Washington,  the  first  president 
of  the  United  States!''  the  people  cried. 

That  was  who  it  was,  and  that,  too,  was  the 
reason  for  the  crowd.  The  United  States  had 
chosen  a  leader  and  was  inaugurating  its  first 
president  there  in  Federal  Hall  in  New  York 
City.  The  cheers  for  President  Washington 
were  so  loud  and  so  long  that  he  could  not 
speak  for  a  few  moments.  He  looked,  smiling, 
at  his  friends  and  then  his  face  grew  suddenly 
sober. 

He  had  seen,  with  great  clearness,  a  figure 
down  there  in  the  crowd  that  the  people  did 
not  know  was  there.  It  was  not  taking  part 
in  their  joy.  It  was  a  gaunt,  tattered,  hope- 
less kind  of  vagabond  with  an  empty  wallet 
and  a  look  of  pinched  want  on  its  face.  It 
wore  the  ragged,  blood  stained  uniform  of  a 
Revolutionary  soldier,  and  it  had  debts  of 
many  millions  of  dollars.  The  few  paper 
bank  notes  in  the  ghost's  pockets  were  little 
more  than  worthless,  for  there  was  not  enough 


122       THE  GHOST  THAT  HAUNTED  WALL  STREET 

gold  and  silver  in  our  national  vaults  for 
which  to  exchange  them.  While  they  could 
buy  food  and  clothing  in  some  states,  in 
others  they  could  buy  nothing  at  all.  Pres- 
ident Washington  was  looking  at  the  ghost  of 
Americans  credit. 

'The  nations  of  the  world  see  that  ghost/' 
he  thought.  They  watch  it  even  across  the 
ocean,  standing  here  on  Wall  Street.  They 
know  that  we  are  in  debt  and  too  poor  to  pay 
our  debts  or  develop  our  business  and  our 
trade.  'What  is  your  independence  worth?' 
they  ask  us.'' 

But  the  happy,  hopeful  crowd  kept  on 
shouting  its  joy  and  President  Washington,  as 
he  waited,  looked  away  from  the  ghost  and 
back  a  good  many  years  into  a  dark,  musty 
counting  house  on  one  of  the  islands  of  the 
West  Indies.    What  he  saw,  you,  too,  may  see. 

Perched  on  top  of  a  hard,  high  stool  and 
bending  over  a  lot  of  thick  books  full  of  figures 
on  the  desk  in  front  of  him,  was  a  little  boy 
twelve  years  old.  His  name  was  Alexander 
Hamilton  and  he  had  a  great  longing  to  be 
rich,  but  his  family  was  poor.    Alexander  had 


THE  GHOST  THAT  HAUNTED  WALL  STREET       123 

been  sent  to  work  in  this  counting  house,  when 
other  boys  were  going  to  school.  It  might 
have  been  fun  for  a  boy  to  work  in  a  grocer^s 
shop,  or  on  the  wharves  where  sweet  smelling 
spices  and  bright  fruits  were  loaded  into  sail- 
ing packets  every  day,  but  Alexander's  work 
was  with  figures,  adding,  subtracting,  multi- 
plying and  dividing  them  and  making  them 
come  out  with  honest  results. 

Dull  work  for  a  boy  of  twelve  years,  was  it 
not?  But  Alexander  Hamilton  grew  to  like 
his  account  books  and  his  balance  sheets.  If 
he  couldn't  be  rich  himself,  he  at  least  learned 
how  other  people  earned  a  good  living  and  paid 
their  debts  and  were  able  to  save  something 
beside.  It  was  a  matter,  he  found  out,  of 
making  the  money  itself  work  in  buying  and 
selling,  in  paying  for  the  labor  of  men's  hands 
and  in  earning  interest.  That  gave  money 
an  increased  value  and  greater  power,  he 
learned. 

As  President  Washington  followed  his 
mind's  picture  of  this  lad  who  so  interested 
him,  he  saw  him  earn  his  passage  to  New 
York  in  order  to  find  greater  opportunity  to 


124      THE  GHOST  THAT  HAUNTED  WALL  STREET 

achieve,  saw  him  graduate  from  Columbia 
college  before  he  was  seventeen,  saw  him,  too, 
a  slight,  dark-eyed  lad,  talking  to  great  crowds 
of  patriots  at  outdoor  meetings  through  the 
Colonies  before  the  Revolution,  urging  them 
to  have  faith  in  themselves  and  courage. 
Nothing  daunted  Alexander  Hamilton.  He 
had  organized  a  corp  of  boy  patriots  called  the 
Hearts  of  Oak  and  drilled  them  every  morning 
at  the  New  York  battery  in  spite  of  the  fact 
that  the  cannon  of  the  troops  of  King  George 
was  being  unloaded  there.  When  the  beacon 
fires  of  the  Revolution  were  lighted  and  New 
York  asked  for  a  company  of  artillery  to  be 
raised,  Alexander  Hamilton  had  begged  for 
its  command.  He  was  only  nineteen  then, 
but  he  was  given  the  commission.  President 
Washington  repeated  to  himself  his  recollec- 
tion of  the  lad's  command: 

''I  remember  the  day,  even,"  he  thought, 
"when  Hamilton's  company  marched  into 
Princeton.  It  was  a  model  of  discipline;  at 
their  head  was  a  boy  and  I  wondered  at  his 
youth.  But  what  was  my  surprise  when, 
struck  with  his  slight  figure,  he  was  pointed 


THE  GHOST  THAT  HAUNTED  WALL  STREET       125 

out  to  me  as  that  Hamilton  of  whom  we  had 
already  heard  so  much.  A  mere  stripling, 
small,  slender,  almost  delicate  in  frame, 
marching  beside  a  piece  of  artillery,  with  a 
cocked  hat  pulled  down  over  his  eyes,  ap- 
parently lost  in  thought,  but  every  now  and 
then  patting  the  cannon  as  if  it  were  a  favorite 
horse  or  a  pet  plaything." 

Suddenly  President  Washington  saw  the 
jBLnal  scene  of  his  picture  of  Alexander  Hamil- 
ton. 

*^He  used  his  last  penny  to  equip  his 
company' ^  he  thought. 

Well,  so  had  the  colonies  used  their  last 
resources  too  in  their  freedom.  Which  should 
triumph  now,  the  ghost  of  poverty  that 
stalked  down  there  in  the  street  and  could 
cover  with  its  fear  the  entire  United  States, 
or  the  spirit  of  financial  courage  as  Alexander 
Hamilton  had  expressed  it,  as  he  had  stood 
there  beside  his  cannon?  President  Washing- 
ton knew  as  he  raised  his  hand  and  the  crowd 
settled  into  silence  to  listen  to  our  first 
inaugural  address.  The  United  States  were 
not  going  into  bankruptcy.   Alexander  Hamil- 


126      THE  GHOST  THAT  HAUNTED  WALL  STREET 

ton,  our  first  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  was 
going  to  find  a  way  out  of  our  poverty. 

When  your  father  comes  home  with  his 
wages  or  salary  in  payment  for  the  work  of 
his  hands  or  his  mind,  and  when  you  know 
that  this  money  will  pay  for  your  food  and 
your  home,  your  schooling  and  your  happiness 
with  some  left  over  to  put  safely  away  in  the 
bank  at  interest,  it  is  hard  to  imagine  how 
poor  we  were  at  the  end  of  the  American 
Revolution.  We  had  no  great  manufacturing 
concerns  for  giving  the  people  work  and 
wages.  We  had  only  rather  worthless  pieces  of 
paper  for  money  that  could  pay  for  little  here 
and  less  abroad.  We  had  no  national  banking 
system  such  as  makes  possible  now  your  buy- 
ing of  Government  bonds  and  thrift  stamps. 
There  was  no  mint  for  coining  gold  and  silver 
into  national  currency.  If  we  needed  to  buy 
foreign  goods  that  we  lacked,  we  could  not 
pay  for  them  and  could  hardly  ask  another 
nation  to  trust  us,  for  we  were  not  sure  when 
we  would  be  able  to  pay  even  our  war  debts. 

We  not  only  owed  money  to  foreign  nations 
for  the  supplies  we  had  needed  to  carry  us 


THE  GHOST  THAT  HAUNTED  WALL  STREET       127 

through  the  time  of  the  Revolution,  but  we 
owed  each  other.  Every  state  had  its  own 
debts  to  individuals  in  money  that  it  had  been 
obliged  to  borrow  for  general  welfare. 

But  we  had  the  working  gold  back  of  us  of  a 
very  bright,  fine  courage  in  our  own  worth, 
and  we  had  a  good  financier  to  help  us,  the 
little  boy  of  the  West  Indian  counting  house, 
grown  to  manhood  and  chosen  by  President 
Washington  as  the  first  Secretary  of  the 
United  States  Treasury. 

From  the  north  to  the  south  all  the  men  of 
the  country  were  anxious  to  get  back  to  work 
after  their  long  task  of  soldiering.  The  north 
wanted  to  build  and  manufacture  and  hunt. 
The  south  wanted  to  raise  tobacco  and  cotton 
and  rice  once  more.  Here,  in  the  work  of 
men's  hands,  Alexander  Hamilton  saw,  was  a 
means  of  creating  national  wealth.  He  rec- 
ommended to  the  Congress  that  foreign 
merchants  bringing  or  sending  their  goods  to 
our  shores  should  pay  a  certain  amount  for  the 
privilege  of  selling  them  to  us.  That  made 
American  products  a  little  cheaper  and  pro- 
tected the  work  of  the  New  England  shoe- 


128      THE  GHOST  THAT  HAUNTED  WALL  STREET 

maker  and  the  Virginia  planter.  If  anyone 
wished  a  pair  of  French  shppers  or  a  dress  of 
English  print  these  could  be  had,  but  the  pro- 
tective tariff  that  made  them  cost  more  gave 
the  Government  money  to  get  out  of  debt. 
It  accomplished  more  than  this.  It  helped 
to  strengthen  and  increase  American  business. 

Alexander  Hamilton's  next  step  was  to  put 
real  value  back  of  the  scraps  of  paper,  dif- 
ferent kinds  for  almost  every  state  in  the 
Union,  that  we  were  trying  to  use  for  money. 
He  transmitted  to  Congress  a  plan  for  having 
a  central  mint  where  precious  metal  should 
be  coined,  under  the  directions  and  control 
of  the  government,  into  real  gold  and  silver 
money.  The  bank  notes  of  the  several  state 
banks  were  given  up  and  national  banks  were 
established  with  a  uniform  system  of  issuing 
bank  notes,  each  one  of  which  was  a  promise 
on  the  part  of  our  nation  to  pay  its  full  face 
value  in  gold  or  silver  from  the  mint. 

We  have  had  great  iron  factories  and  textile 
mills  and  locomotive  works  and  shipbuilding 
yards  and  manufacturing  concerns  for  turning 
out  almost  everything  that  we  need  from 


THE  GHOST  THAT  HAUNTED  WALL  STREET       129 

needles  to  automobiles,  shoes  to  toys,  for  so 
long  that  it  is  hard  to  think  back  to  the  old 
days  after  the  American  Revolution  when 
we  had  none  of  these.  We  are  so  used  to 
knowing  that  a  crisp  green  dollar  bill  can  be 
exchanged  for  as  much  as,  or  more  than  its 
home  value  in  foreign  money  if  we  take  a  trip 
to  Europe  that  it  doesn^t  seem  possible  that 
there  was  once  a  ghost  on  Wall  Street  with 
empty  pockets  and  debts.  Presently,  there 
was  no  ghost.  We  paid  all  that  we  owed 
foreign  countries.  There  was  never  any 
question  about  our  need  of  doing  that.  When 
it  came  to  the  states  who  had  borrowed  among 
themselves,  Alexander  Hamilton  met  diffi- 
culties. 

^'^\Tiy  should  Georgia,  who  owes  only  a  few 
hundred  thousand  dollars  help  to  pay  Massa- 
chusetts^ debt  of  millions?''  the  states  asked. 

*  There  is  only  one  kind  of  honesty,'' 
Alexander  Hamilton  replied,  "and  it  does  not 
allow  for  repudiating  any  debt  no  matter  how 
small.  The  states  are  a  family  and  they  are 
going  to  stand  by  each  other  until  every 


180      THE  GHOST  THAT  HAUNTED  WALL  STREET 

member  has  been  helped  to  pay  what  it  owes." 

That  is  exactly  what  we  did. 

It  was  a  great  step  forward  in  our  progress 
as  a  free  nation.  Poverty  and  debt  make  a 
very  real  kind  of  ghost  and  the  country  that 
gets  rid  of  them  is  better  able  to  hold  its  head 
up,  because  it  has  cast  away  fear.  A  rich 
nation  may  be,  also,  a  helpful  nation.  There 
came  a  time  in  our  history  when  others  who 
were  our  AUies  needed  our  help  and  we  were 
able  to  loan  them  the  money  they  needed 
without  question  and  without  measure. 


THE  ROAD  THAT  WENT  OUT  WEST 

"Look  out,  Dan!  It^s  coming  down  the 
trail  for  you — not  a  squirrel,  but  a  wildcat!'' 
.  With  this  warning  the  boys  of  pioneer  days 
in  old  Pennsylvania  who  had  been  out  hunting 
with  young  Daniel  Boone,  scattered  like  so 
many  scared  rabbits  and  left  the  boy  alone. 
All  around  him  was  the  wilderness,  untracked, 
a  maze  of  deep  forest  and  tangled  underbrush. 
The  Boones  had  a  small  log  cabin  not  so  far 
back  with  a  clearing  where  they  raised 
potatoes  and  corn,  and  Dan,  who  was  about 
eleven  years  old,  had  started  out  that  morning 
with  his  old  fashioned  musket  over  his 
shoulder,  to  shoot  some  squirrels  for  dumer. 
He  wasn't  afraid  of  anything  and  he  liked 
nothing  better  than  tramping  a  trail  through 
the  woods,  but  he  was  only  a  lad,  and  he 
could  hear  the  dried  branches  crackle  beneath 
the  soft  footsteps  of  this  man  killing  beast. 
Dan  did  not  move  an  inch.   He  waited  there 


132  THE  ROAD  THAT  WENT  OUT  WEST 

in  the  middle  of  the  trail  until  he  saw  the 
yellow  coat  and  green  eyes  of  the  wildcat 
showing  against  the  hemlock  and  pine  trees. 
Then  he  raised  his  gun,  aimed,  and  pulled  the 
trigger. 

At  the  sound  of  the  shot,  Dan's  chums 
came  running  back,  and  they  crowded  around 
the  dead  wildcat  where  it  lay  beside  him  on 
the  ground. 

'^Killed  it  with  one  shot!  Hit  it  right  in 
the  heart!''  they  exclaimed,  looking  up  then 
to  tell  Dan  how  plucky  he  had  been,  but  the 
boy  was  not  there. 

He  had  a  kind  of  play  shack  farther  on  in 
the  forest  that  he  had  built  for  himself  of  logs. 
He  had  gone  there  and  was  sitting  in  the  door- 
way. A  brave  lad  of  the  middle  of  our 
eighteenth  century  wearing  a  squirrel  skin 
cap,  a  shirt  and  trousers  and  leggins  of  deer- 
skin, and  holding  his  large,  clumsy  gun  be 
tween  his  knees!  He  was  not  looking  back 
in  the  direction  of  the  big  game  he  had  just 
bagged  and  his  home.  Dan  Boone  was  look- 
ing forward  through  the  wilderness,  beyond 
and  toward  the  west  that  had  no  road  as  yet. 


THE  ROAD  THAT  WENT  OUT  WEST 133 

It  was  known  only  to  wild  beasts  and  to  the 
most  savage  tribes  of  the  American  Indians; 
there  were  no  settlements;  it  was  a  vast, 
unexplored,  unmeasured  place.  Thinking  of 
it,  though,  its  adventure  possibilities  and  its 
dangers,  the  boy's  eyes  shone.  He  stood  up 
and  lifted  his  musket  as  he  looked  westward. 
That  was  the  place  for  him,  he  decided.  He 
was  going  to,  some  day,  start  a  wilderness 
road  that  would  go  west. 

In  the  year  1769,  when  he  was  still  only  a 
young  man,  Daniel  Boone  started  out  to  open 
this  westward  road  of  his  dreams.  His  only 
equipment  was  a  little  flour  and  salt,  flint  and 
tinder  for  making  a  camp  fire,  his  gun,  powder 
horn,  shot  pouch,  tomahawk  and  scalping 
knife  that  hung  from  his  belt.  With  a  few 
friends  he  set  off  on  foot  on  what  he  knew 
might  be  his  greatest  or  his  last  adventure. 

Every  day  brought  its  hazards  and  sur- 
prises. The  Colonies  at  that  time  clung  to  the 
Atlantic  sea  coast  and  no  one  knew  the  west 
except  as  an  unexplored  tract  to  which  the 
savages  had  retreated  from  the  march  of  the 
white  man's   civilization.         Daniel  Boone, 


134 THE  ROAD  THAT  WENT  OUT  WEST 

tracking  it,  slept  on  dried  leaves  and  bear- 
skins; his  only  shelter  was  a  hollow  tree,  and 
he  had  to  cut  his  way  through  man-high 
forest  growth  as  he  went.  Boone's  wilderness 
road  was  the  longest,  hardest,  blackest  trail 
of  all  our  pioneer  days.  He  and  his  men 
could  not  btiild  a  fire  more  than  one  night  in 
one  place,  but  had  to  creep  on  farther  to 
escape  the  Indians.  The  black  bear,  cougar, 
and  wolf  followed  them.  They  never  knew 
whether  it  was  a  deer  or  a  savage  in  wait  for 
them  at  a  game  lick,  the  wild  turkey's  call  or 
that  of  an  Indian  imitating  it  to  lure  them  on 
to  their  death. 

But  Daniel  Boone  was  a  mighty  hunter  and 
a  man  of  gigantic  courage.  He  killed  bears 
and  smoked  their  meat  for  bacon;  as  he  pro- 
gressed he  came  to  streams  where  wild  duck 
could  be  shot,  and  still  farther  on  toward  the 
west  he  had  glimpses  of  open  spaces  where 
wild  cattle  and  buffaloes  grazed.  He  was  our 
first  buffalo  hunter  and  killed  many,  pickling 
the  beef  for  his  winter  use  in  camp.  He  beat 
back  the  Indians  and  once,  when  he  was 
surprised  and  taken  prisoner  by  a  hunting 


Boone's  wilderness  road  was  the  longest,  hardest, 
blackest  trail  of  all  our  pioneer  days. 


THE  ROAD  THAT  WENT  OUT  WEST 135 

party,  he  escaped  in  the  night  and  found  his 
way  back  to  his  trail  with  padded  footsteps 
like  a  panther's. 

Always,  the  wilderness  road  that  Daniel 
Boone  started  went  westward.  It  was  a 
gloomy,  hopeless  way  but  Boone  kept  straight 
on  from  Pennsylvania  through  the  wilds  of 
Virginia  and  Tennessee,  over  mountains, 
fording  streams  and  wading  through  swamps. 
It  was  not  much  more  than  a  blazed  foot  path 
that  he  made,  but  suddenly  it  stopped. 
Daniel  Boone  saw  before  him  the  finish  of  his 
adventure;  the  narrow  path  opened  upon  a 
fair,  smiling  land,  its  groves  pink  with  laurel 
and  white  with  dogwood  blossoms.  The  earth 
was  fertile  and  green  with  pasturage,  lying 
along  the  richest  river  valley  America  pos- 
sessed, the  Kentucky  Valley.  In  the  year 
1775  Daniel  Boone  and  his  party  built  some 
rough  hamlets  here,  surrounded  by  log  stock- 
ades, and  named  the  settlement  Boones- 
borough.  This  was  the  beginning  of  the 
permanent  settlement  of  Kentucky. 

It  was  not  possible  that  so  valiantly  blazed 
a  trail  should  stop.     The  colonists  were  an 


136 THE  ROAD  THAT  WENT  OUT  WEST 

adventure  loving  people  and  they  wanted  to 
continue  this  westward  road.  Behind  Daniel 
Boone  came  a  peaceful  army  of  thousands  of 
settlers,  marching  and  broadening  his  road 
with  the  wheel  ruts  their  wagons  made.  They 
did  not  all  stop  in  Kentucky,  for  they  felt  the 
spell  and  had  dreams  of  the  west  which  kept 
them  moving.  As  early  as  the  year  1788  this 
notice  was  posted  in  one  of  the  frontier  settle- 
ments of  Kentucky: 

'^A  large  company  will  meet  at  the  Crab 
Orchard  the  19th  of  November  in  order  to 
start  the  next  day  through  the  wilderness. 
As  it  is  very  dangerous  on  account  of  the 
Indians,  it  is  hoped  each  person  will  go  well 
armed." 

So  the  prairie  schooners,  great,  clumsy 
wagons  with  a  covering  of  thick  canvas  or 
blankets  started  west.  The  men  and  boys 
rode  ahead  on  horseback  to  break  a  trail,  and 
the  mothers  and  little  ones  were  crowded 
inside  the  schooner  with  a  supply  of  bedding, 
food,  tools,  and  dishes.  They  had  to  carry, 
too,  a  spinning  wheel  and  a  loom,  a  cook 
stove,  seeds  for  the  spring  planting,  a  supply 


THE  ROAD  THAT  WENT  OUT  WEST 137 

of  healing  and  medicinal  herbs  in  case  the 
children  should  be  ill,  the  family  Bible  and  the 
year's  almanac.  Sometimes  a  cow  would 
be  tied  to  the  back  of  the  wagon  and  the 
cackling  of  hens  would  come  from  inside  the 
wagon.  The  way  was  still  a  trackless  wilder- 
ness. Each  day  brought  the  dread  that  the 
covering  of  the  wagon  might  be  pierced  in  a 
dozen  places  by  the  arrows  of  the  Indians,  and 
each  night  these  western  emigrants  rested 
within  hearing  of  the  calls  of  coyotes  and 
panthers. 

But  there  came  always  some  sunrise  on  the 
plains  when  a  prairie  schooner  stopped.  Or 
perhaps  the  sun  rose  for  them  in  the  timber 
land  near  a  great  lake  with  a  trout  stream 
running  through  a  gully  and  plenty  of  game 
to  be  had  in  the  woods.  A  fire  was  built  on 
the  edge  of  the  stream  and  coffee  made  and 
fish  cooked  on  hot  stones.  That  was  one  of 
the  first  hearth  fires  of  the  west.  A  claim 
of  land  was  staked  out  by  driving  in  stumps 
at  its  boundaries,  the  wagon  was  unloaded 
and  the  family  lived  in  a  tent  until  their 
log  house  was  put  up.    Everybody  helped  to 


188  THE  ROAD  THAT  WENT  OUT  WEST 

clear  and  plow  the  land  and  put  in  the  seed- 
grain. 

Here  was  the  second  station  on  the  western 
road,  where  wheel  tracks  stopped  and  a  farm 
began. 

Did  the  road  end  at  this  farm?  Not  a  bit 
of  it.  It  went  right  on,  farther  west  all  the 
time  and  marked  now  by  the  hoof  prints  of 
cattle  and  horses  and  sheep.  It  was  the 
middle  of  the  nineteenth  century  and  the 
western  trail  was  much  broader,  taking  its 
way  through  open  prairie  lands  where  the 
cattle  ranger  who  was  blazing  tha  trail 
pitched  his  camp  itnder  the  stars  at  night. 
He  was  up  and  on  at  daybreak,  though,  his 
face  turned  westward  as  he  drove  his  herds 
toward  the  place  of  plenty  he  felt  the  road 
would  lead  him  to.  The  herd  was  lean, 
active,  muscular,  broad  of  horn  and  fierce. 
It  took  skilful  riding  and  driving  to  keep  the 
cows  together,  but  they  gave  great  promise 
for  the  nation  in  producing  food,  hides  and 
leather. 

At  last  this  herdsman,  too,  stopped.  He 
had  come  to  a  land  with  springs  in  the  hills 


THE  ROAD  THAT  WENT  OUT  WEST 139 

and  ridges  and  woods  for  shelter.  There  was 
unmeasured  pasturage  of  buffalo  grass  and 
black  corn  for  the  herd.  The  herdsman,  with 
other  cattle  rangers  who  joined  him,  made  a 
great  log  corral  for  the  animals  and  mounted 
guns  at  the  corners  to  keep  off  mountain 
lions  and  grizzhes.  They  built  themselves  a 
house  of  thick  pine  boards  with  one  great 
room,  their  bunks  ranged  around  the  sides 
and  the  walls  hung  with  their  saddles,  bridles 
and  ropes.  They  built  a  great  cook  house, 
too,  with  a  long  table  in  the  centre  flanked 
by  benches,  and  a  tin  plate  and  cup  for  each 
man.  The  door  of  their  main  building  was 
twice  as  thick  as  the  walls  and  made  of 
unmatched,  unplaned  boards.  At  any  time 
an  arrow  or  a  bullet  might  imbed  itself  near 
the  latch. 

That  was  the  third  station  on  the  western 
road,  where  hoof  prints  had  led  the  way  in  the 
early  eighties,  to  our  first  ranch. 

Still  the  road  went  on.  Pony  hoofs  were 
marking  it  now.  A  man  equipped  for  a  new 
kind  of  work  mounted  a  wiry  little  horse  and 
rode  westward.    He  wore  rough,  serviceable 


140  THE  ROAD  THAT  WENT  OUT  WEST 

clothes,  a  slouch  hat  and  high,  stout  boots. 
He  carried,  in  a  pack,  and  hung  from  his 
saddle  a  frying  pan,  a  small  iron  pot,  a  knife, 
fork  and  spoon,  some  bacon,  flour,  salt,  beans, 
a  few  candles,  a  shovel  and  a  pick.  At  last 
his  trail  stopped  at  the  foot  of  a  mountain 
with  a  glimpse  of  the  blue  sea  to  be  had  from 
its  top. 

The  man  lost  no  time  in  getting  to  work. 
He  pitched  camp  where  a  stream  flowed  down 
the  mountain  and  began  mining.  He  thought 
that  it  might,  also,  be  a  good  plan  to  utihze 
the  water  power,  so  he  got  help  from  other 
pioneer  trail  riders  who  followed  him  and 
built  a  saw  mill  at  the  foot  of  the  mountain, 
made  a  dam,  dug  the  race  and  put  the  gates 
in  place.  He  turned  the  water  into  the  race 
one  day  to  carry  away  some  of  the  loose  dirt 
and  gravel  and  then  turned  it  off  again.  A 
short  time  later  he  saw  some  shining  yellow 
particles  Ijdng  on  the  bed  rock  of  the  mill 
race  and  picked  them  up  to  look  at  them. 
They  were  bright,  smooth,  and  the  size  of 
wheat  grains.  He  put  a  few  of  these  strange 
bits  of  metal  in  his  kitchen  fire  and  saw  that 


THE  ROAD  THAT  WENT  OUT  WEST  141 

they  did  not  lose  their  yellow  color.  He 
pounded  them  and  found  that  they  were 
malleable.  Then  this  miner  had  an  idea. 
He  took  a  gold  coin  from  his  pocket  and 
compared  it  with  the  metal  he  had  discovered. 
Then  he  could  hardly  believe  the  wonder  that 
his  eyes  showed  him.  "^-^^ 

That  was  where  the  western  road  ended, 
at  a  gold  mine  in  CaUfornia  in  the  year  1848. 

It  had  been  a  Icng,  brave  way  of  progress 
for  the  American  people,  a  trail  two  thousand 
miles  along  the  eastern  edge  of  the  Rocky 
Mountains,  then  hundreds  of  miles  away 
across  plains  and  flowered  prairies.  It  covered 
what  were  later  the  vast  states  of  Texas, 
Kansas,  Wyoming  and  Montana.  It  went  as 
far  west  as  Utah,  Nevada  and  bent  back  to 
the  fertile  lands  of  Missouri,  Iowa  and 
Illinois.  It  would  have  Uked  to  go  on  always, 
but  the  best  that  it  could  do  when  it  reached 
California,  was  to  turn  around  and  come 
back  east. 

It  is  a  triumphant  way  that  the  road  takes 
back.  Shining  steel  rails  carrying  great 
locomotives,    passenger    and    freight    trains 


142 THE  ROAD  THAT  WENT  OUT  WEST 

cover  the  old  wheel  ruts  and  hoof  prints. 
Steamboats  cross  the  rivers  and  lakes  where 
there  were  only  fords  in  those  early  days. 

Gold  and  silver  are  brought  over  it  to  our 
national  mints,  coal  for  our  factories,  pubhc 
works,  schools  and  homes,  timber,  iron,  copper 
and  lead  for  our  own  manufacturing  and 
building  and  to  supply  the  Old  World  as  well. 

The  road  steaming  back  east  passes  the 
place  where  the  lonely  ranchman  corraled  his 
herd.  It  is  a  thousand  miles  of  ranches  now 
with  cattle  and  sheep  that  cannot  be  coimted 
and  huge  cities  built  in  their  midst  for  prepar- 
ing and  packing  and  shipping  the  meat  and 
leather  and  wool  they  yield  to  our  people  and 
our  neighbors  across  the  sea.  The  little,  poor 
farm  where  the  plucky  prairie  schooner 
stopped  has  spread  and  enriched  itself  until 
it  covers  millions  of  acres  of  fertile  grain  and 
orchard  land  where  our  flour,  cereals,  apples, 
oranges,  peaches  and  grapes  are  ripening  to 
feed  us  and  the  world  when  it  asks  us  for  food. 
Schools  and  colleges,  the  chinmeys  of  great 
factories,  Ughts  from  homestead  windows 
where  immigrants  who  have  come  to  our 


THE  ROAD  THAT  WENT  OUT  WEST 1^ 

shores  to  be  free  Americans  live,  forests  of 
timber  for  every  kind  of  building,  deep  oil 
wells,  vast  parks  where  our  little  brothers  in 
feathers  and  fur  live  in  peace  and  freedom, 
these  too  mark  the  way  of  one  of  the  greatest 
roads  in  history-:— our  road  that  went  out  west. 


IN  THE  WAKE  OF  THE  FIRST 
STEAMBOAT 

When  Robert  Fulton  was  a  boy  in  Lan- 
caster, Pennsylvania,  they  called  him  Quick- 
silver Bob  and  it  was  a  very  good  nickname 
for  him.  Tie  not  only  collected  just  as  much 
of  that  strange,  fascinating  metal  as  he  could 
to  experiment  with,  but  he  was  somewhat 
like  quicksilver  himself,  bright  and  active, 
never  content  to  stay  long  in  one  place,  but 
anxious  to  go  farther  on  and  do  something 
that  would  be  important  and  essential. 

The  war  for  American  independence  was 
almost  over  and  we  were  already  a  very  busy 
people.  The  Colonies  were  thinking  about 
making  themselves  over  for  peace  and  wider 
farming  and  bigger  business.  They  were 
trying  to  cut  loose  from  their  old,  slow  way 
of  doing  things.  Manufacturing  on  a  small 
scale  was  beginning  and  the  spirit  of  invention 
was  everywhere. 


IN  THE  WAKE  OF  THE  FIRST  STEAMBOAT        145 

There  was  an  ammunition  factory  in  Lan- 
caster where  guns  for  the  Continental  army- 
were  made  and  Bob  Fulton  in  his  teens  had 
the  run  of  it.  The  workmen  liked  him.  There 
was  a  Hessian  prison  camp  in  Lancaster,  and 
Bob  amused  the  munition  workers  in  the  noon 
hour  by  making  quaint,  life-like  sketches  of 
these  German  soldiers.  He  wanted,  in  return, 
to  be  allowed  to  see  the  working  drawings  for 
guns  and  learn  just  what  kind  of  mechanism 
was  needed  for  carrying  bullets  a  given 
distance.  No  one  minds  having  a  bright  boy 
who  is  really  interested  in  a  man^s  work 
around,  so  Bob  spent  a  good  deal  of  time  at  the 
gun  factory  and  learned  more  than  he  ever 
could  have  in  school  about  machinery. 

He  was  an  outdoor  lad,  also,  and  loved  to 
go  fishing.  One  could  step  from  the  main 
street  of  Lancaster  right  into  a  forest  wilder- 
ness in  those  days,  splendid  for  sport  because 
the  mountains  sent  down  countless  trout 
brooks  in  every  direction,  but  slow  trailing 
for  the  fisherman.  A  hundred  years  before 
a  boy  would  have  done  the  best  he  could  in 
cutting  a  trail  through  the  woods  to  his  fishing 


146        IN  THE  WAKE  OF  THE  FIRST  STEAMBOAT 

hole,  but  our  point  of  view  was  now  changed. 
Bob  Fulton  put  his  mind  to  work  trying  to 
find  some  quicker  mode  of  travel  that  would 
not  only  save  his  time  and  win  for  him  a 
longer  string  of  fish,  but  would  do  the  same 
for  other  boys.  So  he  got  together  what  scrap 
materials  and  tools  he  could  find  and  he  built 
a  new  kind  of  a  boat. 

Up  to  that  time  navigation  by  water  had 
been  a  slow  mode  of  travel.  One  had  to  wait 
for  a  favorable  wind  to  fill  the  sails,  or  carry 
food  stufifs  and  other  necessaries  in  a  drifting 
scow  or  canoe.  But  Quicksilver  Bob  had  an 
idea  about  water  locomotion.  He  built  a 
wheel  that  combined  the  usefulness  of  several 
sets  of  oars  or  paddles  and  attached  it  to  the 
side  of  his  boat.  By  working  this  paddlo 
wheel  with  his  hands  the  lad  was  able  to  travel 
down  a  river  for  a  fishing  trip  much  more 
quickly  than  any  boy  ever  had  before. 

Everybody  liked  Bob  Fulton.  They  did 
not  pay  very  much  attention  to  his  boat,  for 
it  was  an  awkward,  clumsy  sort  of  craft, 
difficult  to  steer  and  apt  to  get  stuck  in  low 
water,  but  they  were  interested  in  the  boy 


IN  THE  WAKE  OF  THE  FIR8T  STEAMBOAT        147 

.  .  ^ 

himself  who  continually  surprised  them  with 
his  inventions. 

As  he  grew  from  boyhood  to  manhood  he 
did  anything  at  hand  to  earn  money  for  the 
materials  he  needed  for  his  tinkering.  He 
drew  plans  for  machinery,  designed  houses 
and  the  family  coaches  which  were  quite 
elaborate  in  those  days,  and  he  painted  signs 
for  the  inns  and  taverns  on  the  Lancaster 
post  road.  Between  times  he  experimented 
with  a  machine  for  cutting  marble,  one  for 
spinning  flax,  a  contrivance  for  twisting  rope 
and  an  earth  scoop  for  digging  canals  and 
helping  with  irrigation.  All  the  time,  though, 
Robert  Fulton's  eyes  were  on  the  water  and 
his  hands  touched,  in  his  imagination,  a 
propeller. 

An  Englishman,  James  Watt,  had  made  a 
valuable  discovery  not  so  many  years  before. 
He  had  found  out  that  a  tea  kettle  of  boiling 
water  was  good  for  something  more  than 
making  a  cup  of  tea.  There  was  power  enough 
in  the  steam  generated  by  the  water  to  force 
off  the  cover  of  the  tea  kettle,  and  by  using 
this  new  found  steam  power  in  a  large  way, 


148        IN  THE  WAKE  OF  THE  FIRST  STEAMBOAT 

James  Watt  had  been  able  to  build  a  high 
pressure  engine  in  which  a  piston,  moved  by 
the  force  of  steam,  pushed  a  wheel  and  made 
it  revolve.  This  was  the  beginning  of  the 
steam  engine  upon  whose  perfection  men 
were  putting  great  hopes.  There  was  need 
in  England  of  finding  a  new  way  of  working 
the  coal  mines  and  of  transporting  the  coal 
to  market.  It  had  to  be  hauled  from  the  pit 
of  the  colliery  to  a  shipping  place,  and  it  was 
heavy  and  of  great  bulk.  James  Watt  was 
building  steam  engines  early  in  the  nineteenth 
century  to  carry  the  coal  from  the  mine,  and 
other  inventors  were  working  on  a  plan  for 
moving  it  along  level  ground,  also  by  steam 
power. 

Robert  Fulton  watched  and  studied  the 
development  of  the  steam  engine.  Suddenly 
his  great  idea  came  and  he  returned  to 
America. 

New  York  was  a  young  giant  in  those  days 
with  feet  firmly  planted  on  the  docks  that 
were  beginning  to  line  the  seaboard,  and 
hands  stretching  up  the  Hudson  and  west, 
even,  for  the  grain  and  ore  and  skins  that 


IN  THE  WAKE  OF  THE  FIRST  STEAMBOAT        149 

Europe  was  asking  for  and  which  the  colonies 
also  needed.  It  still  had  a  green  post  road 
and  clustering  farms  along  a  bowery  way 
whose  gardens  divided  the  town  like  a  brightly 
colored  ribbon,  but  the  lanes  were  broadening 
into  highways,  and  the  buildings  were  a 
story  higher  now.  New  York  had  begun  to 
have  suburbs,  too.  There  was  the  Spitting 
Devil,  a  little  north  of  the  Broad  Way,  so 
called  because  the  river  beat  and  frothed 
so  against  its  banks  at  that  point.  There  was 
also  Greenwich  Village  on  the  North  River 
where  all  sorts  of  people  were  to  be  seen  on 
the  wharf,  from  Dutch  traders  smoking  their 
long  pipes  to  an  occasional  red  face,  still  brave 
in  his  paint  and  feathers. 

There  was  an  especially  large  and  motley 
crowd  of  onlookers  along  the  Greenwich 
Village  wharf  one  summer  afternoon  in  the 
year  1807.  It  was  the  seventeenth  day  of 
August  and  it  seemed  as  if  every  house  in  the 
Village  and  every  tavern  and  shop  had  emptied 
itself.  The  traders  and  farmers  were  talking 
to  each  other  about  some  expected  event  and 
their  comments  differed.    Some  were  anxious, 


160        IN  THE  WAKE  OF  THE  FIRST  STEAMBOAT 

others  were  making  a  joke  of  it,  and  the 
Indians  were  apprehensive. 

"I  have  seen  Fulton's  Folly/'  a  canny 
Dutchman  said,  between  cloudy  puffs  from 
his  pipe.  "She  looks  for  all  the  world  like  a 
back  woods  saw  mill  perched  up  on  a  scow 
and  set  on  fire." 

Two  Indian  hunters  trembled  as  they  spoke 
to  each  other  and  looked  down  the  North 
River: 

"A  monster  moving  on  the  waters,  fighting 
the  winds  and  tides  and  breathing  fire  and 
smoke"  one  of  them  said.  Then  they  fell  to 
their  knees,  praying  for  deUverance,  and  the 
other  men  crowded  to  the  edge  of  the  wharf 
until  they  almost  pushed  each  other  off,  for 
the  expected  was  about  to  happen.  The 
smoking,  fiery  monster  came  slowly  up  the 
North  River  like  some  old  world  dragon, 
walking  the  waters.  Fulton's  Folly  was  in 
sight. 

It  was  a  boat  without  sails,  clumsy  beyond 
description,  and  having  exposed  machinery 
that  groaned  and  creaked  with  every  turn  of 
the  paddle  wheels.     These  wheels  splashed 


IN  THE  WAKE  OF  THE  FIRST  STEAMBOAT        151 

about  so  much  that  they  reminded  one  of  the 
Spitting  Devil  farther  on,  and  the  tiller  was 
not  very  well  placed  for  steering.  Pine  wood, 
which  was  being  used  for  fuel,  sent  a  shower 
of  sparks  shooting  up  into  the  sky  whenever 
the  fire  was  stirred. 

But  the  boat  moved,  as  no  boat  had  before 
in  the  Hudson,  without  the  aid  of  man's 
hands  to  push  her,  or  the  winds  of  heaven  to 
fill  her  sails.  On  the  deck  stood  a  man,  tall 
and  straight,  the  air  from  the  hills  blowing  his 
dark  hair  back  from  his  high  forehead,  and 
his  deep,  far  seeing  eyes  set  on  the  course  up 
the  Hudson  he  was  taking.  It  was  Robert 
Fulton,  who  had  invented  and  built  our  first 
steamboat  which  was  to  be  copied  by  all  the 
nations  and  work  wonders  in  making  travel 
quicker  and  transportation  of  necessities  to 
the  uttermost  parts  of  the  earth  possible. 

This  first  steamboat  was  called  the  Cler- 
mont, and  she  made  her  first  trip  from  New 
York  to  Albany  that  long  ago  August  day 
successfully  under  her  own  steam.  Robert 
Fulton  had  built  her  a  boiler  of  the  same 
pattern  that  Watts  used  in  his  steam  engines 


152        IN  THE  WAKE  OF  THE  FIRST  STEAMBOAT 

and  set  in  masonry.  There  was  only  a  short 
deck  and  the  engine  was  open  to  view.  Back 
of  the  engine  there  was  a  kind  of  cabin  such 
as  we  use  now  on  a  canal  boat  and  this 
sheltered  the  boiler  and  had  a  room  for  the 
ship's  captain  and  engineer.  The  old  sailing 
packet  rudder  was  used,  moved  on  a  tiller, 
and  the  boat  was  very  unwieldy.  The  Cler- 
mont had  the  heart  of  the  ocean  liner  of  today, 
however;  she  moved  under  the  power  and 
control  of  steam. 

Robert  Fulton  was  quick  to  improve  her 
mechanism  and  in  a  short  time  she  was 
making  regular  trips  up  the  Hudson  and  back, 
carrying  passengers  and  freight.  Every 
throb  of  this  long-ago  little  steam  boat's 
engine  was  a  promise  of  the  future  greatness 
of  the  American  people. 

She  was  going  to  deepen  her  hold  and 
broaden  her  deck  until  she  was  able  to  carry 
tools  and  building  materials  to  the  west  along 
the  great  waterways  of  America  and  bring 
back  grains  and  ore.  She  was  the  intrepid 
younger  sister  of  every  colossal  American 
steamship  launched  since  her  day  and  uniting 


IN  THE  WAKE  OF  THE  FIRST  STEAMBOAT         153 

US  with  the  other  nations  of  the  world  by- 
transporting  our  manufactured  goods,  our 
food  and  our  men  to  whoever  needs  them. 


CUTTING  THE  WORLD'S  BREAD 

Cyrus  McConnick's  great  grandfather  had 
been  an  Indian  fighter  in  the  colony  of  Penn- 
sylvania. His  grandfather  had  moved  to 
Virginia  and  fought  in  the  Revolution,  and 
his  father  had  built  a  log  house  and  tilled  a 
farm  in  that  strip  of  arable  Virginia  land  that 
lay  between  the  Blue  Ridge  and  the  Alleghany 
Mountains. 

He  prospered  until  he  added  two  neighbor- 
ing farms  to  the  original  one;  he  had  two 
grist  mills,  two  saw  mills,  a  blacksmith  shop, 
and  a  smelting  furnace.  ;  The  McCormick 
house  and  farm  was  almost  a  small  village 
in  itself.  There  were  eight  children,  and 
their  shoes  were  cobbled,  their  clothes  woven 
and  their  beds  and  chairs  and  tables  were 
made,  and  well  made  too,  at  home.  What- 
ever was  needed  could  be  done;  the  family 
was  always  busy  within  doors  or  without, 
and  the  spirit  of  invention  was  in  the  air.  Here 

copyright 

George  W.  Jacobs  &  Company,  psiladelphia 

ajll  rights  reserved 


CUTTING  THE  WORLD'S  BREAD  155 

in  the  year  1809,  Cyrus  McCormick  was  born. 

He  went  to  one  of  the  Old  Field  Schools,  so 
called  because  it  was  built  on  ground  that  had 
been  abandoned  for  farm  use.  He  learned 
what  other  boys  and  girls  were  learning  in 
country  schools  at  that  time,  but  he  studied 
harder  than  most  of  them,  because  he  had  a 
keen  desire  to  understand  thoroughly  what- 
ever subject  he  started.  At  eighteen  he  began 
studying  surveying,  and  soon  won  a  good 
reputation  in  the  neighborhood  as  an  engineer. 
Much  of  his  time  he  spent  in  the  fields  with 
his  father,  and  here  he  soon  learned  that 
reaping  wheat  was  no  easy  task,  and  that 
swinging  a  wheat  cradle  under  the  summer 
sun  was  hard  on  both  the  temper  and  the 
back. 

The  world  up  to  this  time  had  cut  its  bread, 
in  the  grain,  by  hand,  a  slow,  laborious  way. 
This  boy  on  the  McCormick  farm  who  had 
been  brought  up  to  tackle  any  job  that  the 
day  brought,  from  drawing  a  map  to  resoling 
his  shoes,  decided  to  try  and  solve  the  problem 
of  how  to  harvest  wheat  by  machine. 

There  were  some  almost  unsurmountable 


156 CUTTING  THE  WORLD'S  BREAD 

difficulties  that  faced  him  in  this  task.  There 
was  the  problem  of  how  to  separate  the  grain 
that  was  to  be  cut  from  that  which  was  to 
be  left  standing.  His  father  had  built  a 
machine  that  would  cut  but  left  the  wheat 
after  cutting  in  a  badly  tangled  shape.  Cyrus 
saw  that  this  was  not  efficient.  A  reaper  to 
be  of  real  use  must  dispose  of  the  grain  prop- 
erly as  well  as  shear  the  stalks.  He  finally 
added  a  curved  arm,  or  divider,  to  the  end  of 
his  reaper's  blade.  In  this  way  the  grain  that 
was  to  be  cut  could  be  properly  fed  to  the 
knife. 

But  the  grain  was  apt  to  be  badly  tangled 
before  the  reaper  reached  it,  and  Cyrus  wanted 
his  machine  to  be  able  to  cut  the  stalks  that 
were  pressed  to  the  ground  and  out  of  shape 
as  well  as  it  cut  the  straight  stalks.  He 
decided  that  his  reaping  blade  must  have  two 
motions,  one  a  forward  cut,  and  the  other 
sideways.  He  tried  countless  plans  before  he 
finally  hit  upon  the  right  one.  It  was  a 
straight  knife  blade  that  moved  forward  and 
backward,  cutting  with  each  motion. 

Yet,  even  though  the  reaper  could  divide 


CUTTING  THE  WORLD'S  BREAD 157 

the  grain  properly  and  the  knife  cut  with  a 
double  motion,  there  was  still  the  danger  that 
the  blade  might  simply  press  the  grain  down 
and  so  slide  over  it.  That  was  very  apt  to  be 
the  case  after  a  rain,  or  when  the  grain  had 
been  badly  blown  about  by  the  wind.  The 
problem  now  was  how  to  hold  it  upright. 
Cyrus  discovered  how  to  do  this  by  adding 
a  row  of  indentations  that  projected  a  few 
inches  from  the  edge  of  the  knife  and  acted 
like  fingers  in  catching  the  wheat  stalks  and 
holding  them  in  place  to  be  cut. 

These  three  ideas,  the  divider,  the  blade 
that  would  work  backward  or  forward  and 
the  fingers,  met  the  question  of  how  the  grain 
was  to  be  cut.  To  these  Cjo-us  added  a  re- 
volving reel  that  would  lift  any  grain  that  had 
fallen  and  straighten  it,  and  a  platform  to 
catch  the  grain  as  it  was  cut  and  fell.  His 
idea  was  that  a  man  should  walk  along  be- 
side the  reaper  and  rake  off  the  grain  as  it 
fell  upon  the  platform.  Two  more  devices, 
and  his  first  reaper  was  completed.  One  was 
to  have  the  shafts  placed  on  the  outside  so 
that  the  horse  would  pull  it  sideways.     The 


158  CUTTING  THE  WORLD'S  BREAD 

other  was  to  have  the  whole  machine  operated 
by  one  large  wheel  that  bore  the  weight  and 
moved  the  knife  and  the  reel. 

It  had  taken  young  McCormick  a  good 
many  months  to  work  out  all  these  problems 
and  there  were  only  one  or  two  weeks  each 
year,  the  harvest  weeks,  when  he  could 
actually  try  his  reaper.  He  wanted  to  have 
it  ready  for  a  final  test  the  spring  when  he  was 
twenty-two  years  old,  but  the  work  of  getting 
all  the  parts  together  was  very  great.  He 
begged  his  father,  though,  to  leave  a  small 
patch  of  wheat  for  him  to  try  to  cut,  and  at 
last,  in  the  early  summer,  he  drove  his 
cumbersome  machine  into  the  field. 

All  his  family  watched  as  the  reaper  headed 
toward  the  grain.  They  saw  the  wheat 
gathered  and  swept  down  upon  the  knife, 
they  saw  the  blade  move  back  and  forth  and 
cut  the  grain,  and  then  saw  it  fall  on  the  little 
platform.  The  machine  worked  not  nearly 
so  smoothly  or  so  fast  as  it  should,  but  it  did 
work.  It  gathered  the  grain  in  and  it  left  it 
in  good  shape  to  be  raked  off  the  platform. 
The  young  inventor  drove  it  proudly  back 


CUTTING  THE  WORLD'S  BREAD 169 

to  his  workshop  and  made  certain  changes 
in  the  reel  and  in  the  divider.  Then,  several 
days  later,  he  drove  it  over  to  the  little  settle- 
ment of  Steele's  Tavern  and  cut  six  acres  of 
oats  in  one  afternoon.  That  was  a  marvelous 
feat  and  caused  great  wonder  throughout  the 
entire  countryside. 

At  that  time  labor  was  very  scarce  in  the 
great  central  region  of  our  country  and  the 
farms  were  enormous.  The  wheat  was  going 
to  waste,  for  there  were  not  enough  scjrthes 
and  sickles  to  cut  it.  Cyrus  McCormick 
believed  that  every  farm  needed  one  of  his 
reapers,  but  it  had  taken  all  his  savings  to 
build  the  first  one,  and  it  was  not  until  1840 
that  a  stranger  rode  up  to  his  door  and  offered 
to  pay  him  fifty  dollars  for  a  reaper.  But  he 
had  faith,  and  worked  on  the  farm  to  earn 
money  for  more  materials  and  he  patented 
his  reaper.  Then  he  discovered  a  small 
deposit  of  iron  ore  in  the  neighborhood  and 
built  himself  a  furnace  and  began  to  make 
iron.  His  log  workshop  became  a  factory  on 
a  small  scale,  and  orders  for  reapers  at  higher 
prices  began  to  come  in  from  the  farms  in  the 


160 CUTTING  THE  WORLD'S  BREAD 

far  west.  The  little  home  factory  was  being 
pushed  to  the  utmost. 

Chicago  in  1847  was  still  not  much  more 
than  a  frontier  town.  It  had  fought  gamely 
with  floods  and  droughts,  cholera  and  panics, 
pirates  and  land  thieves.  But  it  was  bound 
to  grow,  for  railroads  would  have  to  come  to 
bring  the  wheat  and  others  to  carry  it  away. 
Cyrus  McCormick  needed  a  central  point  for 
building  his  reapers  and  shipping  them.  He 
studied  this  matter  with  the  greatest  care, 
and  finally  decided  that  the  best  place  was 
the  little  town  of  Chicago,  lying  on  a  great 
lake,  and  halfway  between  the  western  wheat 
fields  and  the  mills  and  docks  of  the  eastern 
seaboard. 

He  had  to  borrow  money  to  move  his 
machinery  and  set  up  manufacturing  in 
Chicago,  but  he  knew  that  this  hazard  was 
part  of  the  game. 

Cyrus  McCormick  was  not  only  an  inven- 
tor, but  a  business  builder,  one  of  those  great 
pioneers  in  the  field  of  United  States  manu- 
facturing that  was,  later  to  make  our  nation 
so  essential  and  far  reaching  in  its  influence 


CUTTING  THE  WORLD'S  BREAD  161 

on  the  world.  He  knew  he  had  a  machine 
that  would  lessen  labor  and  increase  wealth 
wherever  wheat  was  grown,  and  he  felt  that 
it  was  his  work  to  see  that  the  reaper  did  its 
share  in  speeding  the  progress  of  the  world. 

Just  as  he  had  studied  the  problem 
of  cutting  wheat,  so  he  studied  now  the  pro- 
blem of  selling  his  reapers  in  such  a  w^ay  that 
every  farmer  should  own  one.  He  believed 
in  advertising,  and  he  had  some  posters 
printed  with  a  picture  of  the  reaper  at  the 
top  and  underneath  a  statement  telling  just 
what  the  machine  would  do.  There  was  a 
space  beneath  this  for  the  signature  of  the 
farmer  who  bought  it,  and  the  man  who  sold 
it,  and  two  witnesses  beside.  The  price  of  a 
reaper  was  now  one  hundred  and  tw^enty  dol- 
lars. The  farmer  paid  part  of  this  down  and 
the  balance  at  the  end  of  six  months,  provided 
the  reaper  would  cut  one  and  a  half  acres  an 
hour.  This  guarantee,  with  the  chance  to 
have  the  money  back  if  the  reaper  proved  a 
failure,  was  a  new  idea  and  seemed  to  the 
farmers  an  honorable  way  of  doing  business. 
More  than  this,  Cyrus  McCormick  printed 


162 CUTTING  THE  WORLD'S  BREAD 

in  newspapers  and  farm  journals,  letters  he 
had  received  from  farmers  teUing  what  their 
reapers  were  doing  for  them. 

In  these  new  ways,  the  foundation  of  an 
enormous  business  was  laid. 

So  important  an  invention  as  the  reaper  was 
certain  to  need  improvements,  but  for  a 
number  of  years  the  only  additions  were  seats 
for  the  driver  and  the  raker.  How  to  bind  the 
grain  was  more  difficult.  McCormick  was 
deep  in  the  study  of  this  when  a  man  named 
Withington  came  to  him  from  Wisconsin  and 
said  that  he  had  a  machine  for  binding  grain. 
He  showed  it  to  McCormick,  two  steel  arms, 
which  would  catch  each  bundle  of  grain,  pass 
a  wire  about  it,  and  twist  the  ends  of  the  wire, 
cut  it  loose  and  throw  the  sheaf  on  the  ground. 
Cyrus  McCormick  bought  the  rights  to  manu- 
facture the  binder  in  connection  with  his 
reaper  and  tried  it  on  a  farm  near  Chicago. 
It  worked  perfectly,  cutting  fifty  acres  of 
wheat  and  binding  it  into  sheaves. 

At  last  only  one  person  was  needed  to 
harvest  the  wheat,  the  one  who  sat  on  the 
driver's  seat  and  had,  simply,  to  guide  the 


CUTTING  THE  WORLD'S  BREAD  163 

horses.  A  boy  could  do  all  the  work  of 
harvesting  that  it  had  taken  a  score  of  men 
to  do  twenty  years  before. 

The  reaper  was  needed,  first,  in  America 
because  farm  labor  was  scarce  and  the  wheat 
fields  enormously  fertile.  We  would  never 
have  been  able  to  open  the  west  as  soon  as  we 
did  if  men  had  been  obliged  to  cut  grain  by 
hand  as  they  did  at  first.  Cyrus  McCormick, 
through  his  invention,  was  one  of  the  builders 
of  our  nation  and  he  also  helped  us  to  help 
other  nations  get  their  daily  bread. 

Before  long  the  American  reaper  began  to 
whir  in  the  wide  wheat  fields  of  European 
Russia  and  Liberia,  in  Germany  and  France 
and  in  the  Slavic  countries,  in  India,  and  in 
the  Argentine.  Today  we  can  be  heard 
reaping  wherever  in  the  world  there  is  grain 
to  be  cut.  The  reaper  made  the  output  of 
grain  many  times  what  it  had  been  before 
and  it  had  its  part  in  our  development  as  a 
great,  free  people.  Wherever  an  invention 
is  able  to  release  man's  hands  for  more  skilled 
uses  a  step  forward  in  national  progress  has 
been  taken. 


WHEN  JOHNNY  BULL  AND  BROTHER 
JONATHAN  SHOOK  HANDS 

The  Knickerbocker  folk  who  Hved  in  Wash- 
ington Square  near  the  New  York  University 
in  the  early  eighties  would  have  told  you  that 
either  a  toymaker  or  a  magician  had  a  work- 
shop there  in  the  University  building.  Almost 
any  one  could  have  repeated  something  weird 
and  unusual  about  Mr.  Samuel  Morse,  who 
went  into  the  building  early  in  the  morning, 
began  tinkering  in  the  room  he  had  rented 
there  and  sometimes  did  not  go  home  until 
the  man  who  lighted  the  street  lamps  came 
along  with  his  torch  and  ladder. 

Mr.  Morse  had  patronized  the  small  shops 
that  hung  out  their  signs  along  the  edges  of 
Washington  Square  and  had  bought  many 
different  kinds  of  materials  for  his  work. 
Among  these  were  the  wheels  of  an  old  wooden 
clock,  a  wooden  pendulum,  some  bees  wax,  a 
great  deal  of  wire  from  the  milliner  who  made 


JOHNNY  BULL  AND  BROTHER  JONATHAN  165 

bonnet  frames,  some  carpet  binding,  an 
electro  magnet,  an  old  picture  frame  and 
other  things  as  old  and  apparently  useless. 

A  few  persons  who  had  been  inside  Mr. 
Morse's  workroom  in  the  University  described 
it  as  an  uncanny  kind  of  place.  They  said 
that  there  were  wires  suspended  there,  extend- 
ing from  one  end  of  the  room  to  the  other  and 
returning  many  times  until  they  covered 
a  length  of  several  hundred  feet.  The  electro 
magnet  was  fastened  in  the  wooden  picture 
frame,  set  up  vertically  and  connected  with 
the  wires.  In  front  of  the  magnet  was  a 
wooden  lever  or  arm  fitted  so  that  it  would 
hold  a  pencil  in  the  end.  What  could  be  the 
meaning  of  this  attempt  at  invention?  Mr. 
Morse  was  known  to  have  been  very  much 
interested  in  electricity  when  he  was  a  boy 
at  Yale  College.  He  felt  that  it  could  be 
made  to  accomplish  wonders  for  the  world. 
But  what  was  he  doing  with  it  up  there  among 
his  cobweb  lines  of  wires? 

At  last  not  even  the  lamp  lighter  saw  Mr. 
Morse  at  supper  time,  because  he  was  living 
in  his  workroom  and  even  sleeping  there. 


166         JOHNNY  BULL  AND  BROTHER  JONATHAN 

He  seemed  to  be  very  poor,  the  groceryman 
who  sold  him  his  supplies  said,  for  he  bought 
his  food  in  such  small  quantities.  Sounds  of  a 
metallic  tapping  issued  from  his  room,  and  it 
was  said  that  the  pencil  he  had  attached  to  his 
magnet  could  make  zigzag  markings  on  paper 
without  the  aid  of  human  hands.  The  whole 
matter  was  amazing  and  might  have  been  set 
down  as  being  of  a  part  with  sorcery  but  for 
the  fact  that  Mr.  Morse  left  New  York  at 
last  with  his  materials  and  went  to  Washing- 
ton. 

The  Congress  was  sitting  in  Washington 
in  December  of  the  year  1842  with  a  great  deal 
of  business  in  its  hands.  The  United  States 
was  making  money  and  spending  money  and 
this  particular  session  of  the  Congress  was 
trying  to  vote  wisely  on  its  last  day  on  over 
one  hundred  different  bills.  Some  of  the 
lawmakers  had  seen  Mr.  Morse's  ingenious 
electrical  toy  four  years  before  when  he  had 
exhibited  it  there  and  asked  the  Congress  to 
appropriate  some  money  so  that  he  might 
perfect  it,  but  none  of  them  had  much  faith 
in  the  wizardry  he  beUeved  he  had  invented. 


JOHNNY  BULL  AND  BROTHER  JONATHAN  167 

Still  Mr.  Morse  kept  appealing  to  the  Congress 
for  help,  and  one  of  the  bills  before  it  on  this 
special  day  had  to  do  with  his  magnets  and 
wires  and  strange  tappings. 

Samuel  Morse,  himself,  sat  in  the  gallery 
listening  to  the  voting  of  the  Congress  until 
it  was  evening.  There  was  little  use  of  his 
doing  anything  else  for  he  would  have  less 
than  a  dollar  when  he  paid  his  hotel  bill.  One 
after  another  the  bills  before  it  were  voted 
on  by  the  Congress  and  at  last  Mr.  Morse  left. 
He  had  decided  to  give  up  this  dream  that  he 
had  for  his  country. 

But  the  next  morning  news  was  brought  to 
him  that  just  before  it  adjourned.  Congress 
had  voted  thirty  thousand  doUars^to  test  and 
develop  his  invention — the  electric  telegraph. 

Then  there  was  excitement  throughout  the 
States.  ■  If  Samuel  Morse's  telegraph  idea 
worked,  news  would  travel  like  lightning. 
The  postrider,  the  pony  express,  the  railroad 
train  and  the  steamboat  would  all  be  out- 
distanced. The  mills  of  New  England  where 
calico  was  made  could  hear  almost  instantly 
what  to  expect  from  the  South  in  the  way  of 


168         JOHNNY  BULL  AND  BROTHER  JONATHAN 

cotton  crops.  A  family  living  in  Boston  or 
Philadelphia  could  have  quick  word  of  the 
safe  arrival  of  the  boy  who  went  out  to  Cali- 
fornia to  the  mines.  Such  dangers  as  train 
robberies,  railroad  accidents,  fires,  sudden 
illness,  floods  and  devastating  storms  could 
be  reported  at  once  and  aid  sent.  The  tele- 
graph would  bring  the  states  together  in  a  way 
that  no  one  had  dreamed  of  their  being 
united  before.  Could  such  wonders  be  ac- 
complished though?  That  was  the  question, 
and  the  American  people  went  to  work  to 
find  out. 

Samuel  Morse  had  discovered  that  there 
was  almost  no  limit  to  the  distance  which 
electricity  will  travel  along  a  wire.  He  had 
also  invented  a  system  of  breaking  this 
electric  current  at  certain  points  on  his  wires 
and  producing  a  spark.  He  thought  that  a 
spark  might  stand  for  a  letter  in  the  alphabet, 
and  the  absence  of  a  spark  for  another  letter. 
The  length  of  the  space  between  the  sparks 
might  indicate  still  a  third  letter.  In  this  way 
he  had  built  an  alphabet  which  his  pencil 
in    the    old    New    York    workshop     had 


JOHNNY  BULL  AND  BROTHER  JONATHAN  169 

recorded  automatically  by  means  of  signs,  and 
the  transmission  of  messages,  unseen,  by  wire 
had  been  invented. 

An  overhead  telegraph  line  of  wires  strung 
on  poles  was  constructed  between  Washington 
and  Baltimore.  There  was  an  electrical 
sending  battery  at  one  end  and  a  receiving 
battery  at  the  other.  Through  the  help  of 
Mr.  Alfred  Vail,  a  friend  of  Samuel  Morse, 
the  method  of  sending  messages  by  telegraph 
was  improved.  Dots  and  dashes  of  varying 
lengths  were  used  to  indicate  the  letters  and 
these  were  recorded  on  paper  by  a  sharp 
pointed  piece  of  metal  instead  of  by  a  pencil, 
making  the  message  more  permanent.  At 
last  this  first,  crude  telegraph  line  was  com- 
pleted and  the  first  message  was  transmitted 
on  May  24,  1844  from  Washington  to  Balti- 
more. 

It  was  this: 

'What  hath  God  wrought?" 

The  words  were  received  in  Baltimore 
successfully.  The  mystery  of  Samuel  Morse's 
Washington  Square  junk  shop  had  become 
the  reality  of  the  telegraph.    It  was  going  to 


170         JOHNNY  BULL  AND  BROTHER  JONATHAN 

weld  together,  by  its  unseen  power,  families 
and  friends  who  were  separated,  far  distant 
states,  nations  thousands  of  miles  apart, 
bring  almost  instantaneous  news  of  war  and 
of  peace,  of  danger,  and  of  success  and 
happiness. 

Since  the  American  people  had  begun  play- 
ing wizard  in  this  wonderful  way  of  sending 
messages  from  one  to  another  by  electricity, 
they  decided  that  more  marvels  could  be 
accomplished.  Why  not  have  an  under-sea 
telegraph,  Mr.  Cyrus  W.  Field  thought,  that 
would  make  it  possible  for  the  Old  World 
to  talk  to  the  New  just  as  the  states  could 
talk  to  each  other?  That  was  a  great  thought 
and  a  daring  venture,  for  England  and 
America  were  separated  by  thousands  of 
miles  of  deep,  stormy  ocean. 

England  wanted  to  help,  though.  She  was 
interested  in  the  man-size  nation  that  had 
grown  up  from  her  fighting  apprentice,  the 
American  Colonies,  and  she  thought  that  a 
fine  way  of  getting  better  acquainted  would 
be  this  Atlantic  cable  which  Mr.  Field,  an 


JOHNNY  BULL  AND  BROTHER  JONATHAN  171 

American  business  man,  believed  could  be 
laid. 

There  were  great  difficulties  in  preparing  a 
wire  that  could  be  placed  at  the  bottom  of 
the  ocean.  It  had  to  be  a  particularly  heavy 
kind  of  wire  securely  wrapped  up  in  gutta 
percha  bound  with  tape  and  yarn,  brass  and 
tarred  hemp,  and  over  all  these  coverings 
coils  of  stout  wire  had  to  be  wound  to  protect 
the  cable  from  the  rocks.  England  supplied 
two  ships  and  the  United  States  two,  and 
Mr.  Field  crossed  the  ocean  thirty  times  in 
making  arrangements  for  this  gigantic  enter- 
prise of  trying  to  lay  the  cable. 

If  the  first  ships  setting  out  from  England, 
their  decks  loaded  with  these  great  coils  of 
heavy  wires,  had  been  successful  in  placing 
the  cable  safely  at  the  bottom  of  the  ocean, 
this  story  would  not  be  so  exciting.  If.the 
second  expedition  had  not  broken  the  cable 
and  nearly  lost  its  ships,  we  would  not  have 
had  another  story  about  two  nations  that 
never  like  to  give  up.  It  was  the  third 
expedition,  though,  that  made  history.  Four 
ships,  two  English  and  two  American,  met  in 


172         JOHNNY  BULL  AND  BROTHER  JONATHAN 

the  middle  of  the  Atlantic  Ocean.  There, 
midway  between  the  nations,  they  spliced 
the  cable,  dropped  it,  and  started  on  their 
perilous  routes  back,  two  ships  going  to 
Great  Britain  and  two  to  America,  laying  the 
cable  as  they  went.  It  was  almost  as  if  we 
had  shaken  hands  with  England  out  there  in 
mid-ocean. 

One  day  in  the  summer  of  the  year  1858, 
the  President  of  the  United  States,  James 
Buchanan,  received  the  first  cablegram  that 
had  ever  been  sent  to  our  country.  It  made 
its  way  by  electricity  along  the  successfully 
laid  Atlantic  cable  under  the  deep  seas  and 
among  the  rocks  of  all  those  miles  of  ocean. 
It  was  sent  by  Queen  Victoria  of  England 
to  us  and  it  read: 

"The  Queen  desires  to  congratulate  the 
President  upon  the  successful  completion  of 
this  great  work,  in  which  the  Queen  has  taken 
the  deepest  interest. 

"The  Queen  is  convinced  that  the  President 
will  join  with  her  in  fervently  hoping  that  the 
electric  cable  which  now  connects  Great 
Britain  with  the  United  States  will  prove  an 


1 

■  f             * 

1        ■ 

m 

\ 

r 

1/         I 

^ 

L_ 

E 

/ 

1 

There,  midway  between  the  nations,  they  spliced 
the  cable. 


JOHNNY  BULL  AND  BROTHER  JONATHAN  173 

additional  link  between  the  nations  whose 
friendship  is  founded  upon  their  common 
interest  and  reciprocal  esteem. 

^The  Queen  has  much  pleasure  in  thus 
communicating  with  the  President  and  renew- 
ing to  him  her  wishes  for  the  prosperity  of  the 
United  States/' 

It  was  a  very  great  day  for  us  and  every- 
body felt  like  taking  a  holiday  and  celebrating, 
just  as  we  do  sometimes  now.  Work  stopped 
in  all  the  Government  buildings  at  Washing- 
ton and  the  city  was  red,  white  and  blue  for 
the  day.  They  were  laying  out  Central  Park 
in  New  York  City,  but  the  workmen  put  their 
spades  and  rakes  over  their  shoulders  and  had 
a  parade  down  Broadway.  Out  in  the  western 
cities  they  rang  the  church  bells,  fired  cannon, 
and  burned  barrels  of  tar  at  the  street  corners. 
Torchlight  processions  were  held  everywhere 
that  evening,  and  the  people  who  marched 
carried  transparencies  that  were  very  popular 
at  that  time.  They  were  made  in  box  shape 
of  oiled  paper,  lettered,  lighted  inside  and 
strung  on  poles.  One  of  these  transparencies 
had  a  very  important  message  about  the 


174         JOHNNY  BULL  AND  BROTHER  JONATHAN 

newly  laid  Atlantic  cable,  even  if  it  was  a 
kind  of  joke.    It  read: 

'^Lightning  Caught  and  Tamed  by 
Benjamin  Franklin.  Taught  to  Read  and 
Write  and  go  on  errands  by  Samuel  Morse. 
Started  in  the  Foreign  Trade  by  Field,  Cooper 
and  Co.,  with  Johnny  Bull  and  Brother 
Jonathan  as  Special  Partners.'' 

There  were,  of  course,  delays  and  dis- 
couragements in  perfecting  our  telegraph  and 
cable  systems.  The  Civil  War  interfered, 
because  a  fight  to  disrupt  the  Union  pre- 
vented all  these  steps  for  bringing  the  states 
closer  together.  But  in  a  few  years  there  was 
a  telegraph  line  built  and  in  use  that  spanned 
the  entire  North  American  Continent  and  we 
had  also  united  Great  Britain  and  the  United 
States  so  successfully  that  the  Atlantic  cable 
was  in  constant  use. 

Slowly  but  steadily  the  giant  trees  of  our 
American  forests  left  their  centuries  old  home 
in  the  woods  to  take  their  places  along  new 
roads  and  hold  the  network  of  telegraph 
wires  that  were  charged  every  minute,  night 
and  day,  with  our  nation's  messages.    Tele- 


JOHNNY  BULL  AND  BROTHER  JONATHAN  175 

graph  oJ05ces  were  built,  not  only  in  our  large 
cities,  but  wherever  the  railroad  stopped. 
A  new  American,  the  telegraph  operator,  took 
his  place  in  each  telegraph  office  with  a  key- 
board in  front  of  him  on  which  to  send  and 
receive  messages  that  flashed  in  a  few  minutes 
across  distances  covered  so  slowly  in  the 
former  years  by  the  man  on  horseback  and  the 
stage  coach. 

The  telegraph  and  the  cable  quickened 
American  business.  It  made  American  life 
safer  and  closer.  The  greatest  thing  it  did, 
though,  was  to  unite  Johnny  Bull  and  Brother 
Jonathan,  Uncle  Sam's  elder  brother,  in  a 
s'pecial  kind  of  partnership  which  they  had  not 
shared  before. 


A  SLAVE  AMONG  SLAVES 

I  was  born  a  slave  on  a  plantation  in 
Franklin  County,  Virginia.  As  nearly  as  I 
have  been  able  to  learn,  I  was  born  near  a 
crossroad's  post  office  called  Hale's  Ford, 
and  the  year  was  1858  or  1859. 

My  life  had  its  beginning  in  the  midst  of 
most  desolate  and  discouraging  surroundings. 
This  was  not  because  my  owners  were  especial- 
ly cruel,  for  they  were  not,  as  compared  with 
many  others.  I  began  life  in  a  log  cabin 
about  fourteen  by  sixteen  feet  square.  In 
this  cabin  I  lived  with  my  brother  and  sister 
till  after  the  Civil  War,  when  we  were  all 
declared  free. 

The  cabin  was  not  only  our  living  place, 
but  was  also  used  as  the  kitchen  for  the 
plantation.  My  mother  was  the  plantation 
cook.  The  cabin  was  without  glass  windows; 
it  had  only  openings  in  the  side  which  let  in 
the  light,  and  also  the  cold,  chilly  air  of  winter. 


A  BLAVE  AMONG  SLAVES 177 

There  was  a  door  to  the  cabin — that  is,  some- 
thing that  was  called  a  door — ^but  the  un- 
certain hinges  by  which  it  was  hung,  and  the 
large  cracks  in  it,  to  say  nothing  of  the  fact 
that  it  was  too  small,  made  the  room  a  very 
uncomfortable  one.  There  was  no  wooden 
floor  in  our  cabin,  the  naked  earth  being  used 
as  a  floor.  In  the  centre  of  the  earthen  floor 
there  was  a  large,  deep  opening  covered  with 
boards,  which  was  used  as  a  place  for  storing 
sweet  potatoes  during  the  winter.  There  was 
no  cooking-stove  on  our  plantation,  and  all 
the  cooking  for  the  whites  and  the  slaves  my 
mother  had  to  do  over  an  open  fireplace,  and 
mostly  in  pots  and  skillets. 

The  early  years  of  my  life  were  not  very 
different  from  those  of  thousands  of  other 
slaves.  My  mother  snatched  a  few  moments 
for  our  care  in  the  early  morning  before  her 
work  began,  and  at  night  after  the  day's  work 
was  done.  We  three  children  had  a  pallet 
on  the  dirt  floor.  I  cannot  remember  having 
slept  in  a  bed  until  after  our  family  was  de- 
clared free  by  the  Emancipation  Proclamation. 

I  have  been  asked  to  tell  something  about 


178 A  SLAVE  AMONG  SLAVES 

the  sports  I  engaged  in  during  my  youth. 
Until  that  question  was  asked  it  had  never 
occurred  to  me  that  there  was  never  any  time 
in  my  Hfe  for  play;  almost  every  day  was 
occupied  with  some  kind  of  labor.  During 
my  period  of  slavery  I  was  not  large  enough 
to  be  of  much  service,  still  I  was  kept  busy 
most  of  the  time  in  cleaning  the  yards,  carry- 
ing water  to  the  men  in  the  fields,  or  going  to 
the  mill  with  corn  once  a  week  to  be  ground. 
This  trip  I  always  dreaded. 

The  heavy  bag  of  corn  would  be  thrown 
across  the  back  of  the  horse,  and  the  corn 
divided  about  evenly  on  each  side.  But  in 
some  way,  almost  without  exception  on  these 
trips,  the  corn  would  so  shift  as  to  become 
unbalanced  and  would  fall  off  the  horse,  and 
I  would  fall  with  it.  As  I  was  not  strong 
enough  to  reload  the  corn  upon  the  horse  I 
would  have  to  wait  sometimes  for  hours, 
until  a  passer-by  came  along  who  would  help 
me  out  of  my  trouble.  I  would  be  late  in 
reaching  the  mill,  and  by  the  time  I  got  my 
corn  ground  and  reached  home  it  would  be  far 
into  the  night.    The  road  was  a  lonely  one 


A  SLAVE  AMONG  SLAVES 179 

and  led  through  dense  forests.  I  was  always 
frightened.  Besides,  when  I  was  late  in 
getting  home  I  knew  I  would  always  get  a 
severe  scolding  or  a  flogging. 

I  had  no  schooling  whatever  while  I  was 
a  slave,  though  I  remember  going  on  several 
occasions  as  far  as  the  school-house  door  with 
one  of  my  young  mistresses  to  carry  her  books. 
The  picture  of  several  dozen  boys  and  girls  in 
a  schoolroom  engaged  in  study  made  a  deep 
impression  on  me,  and  I  had  the  feeling  that 
to  get  into  a  school-house  and  study  in  this 
way  would  be  about  the  same  as  getting  into 
paradise. 

One  may  get  the  idea  from  what  I  have  said 
that  there  was  bitter  feeling  toward  the  white 
people  on  the  part  of  my  race  because  of  the 
fact  that  most  of  the  white  population  fought 
in  a  war  which  would  result  in  keeping  the 
negro  in  slavery  if  the  South  was  successful. 
In  the  case  of  the  slaves  on  our  place  this  was 
not  true,  and  it  was  not  true  of  any  large 
portion  of  the  slaves  in  the  South  that  were 
treated  with  any  kind  of  decency.  During 
the  Civil  War  one  of  my  young  masters  was 


180  A  SLAVE  AMONG  SLAVES 

killed  and  two  were  brought  home  severely 
wounded.  The  sorrow  in  the  slave  quarter 
was  only  second  to  that  in  the  ^'big  house." 
Some  of  the  slaves  begged  to  sit  up  at  night 
and  nurse  their  wounded  masters.  The  slave 
who  was  selected  to  sleep  in  the  "big  house" 
during  the  absence  of  the  men  was  considered 
to  have  a  place  of  honor.  In  order  to  defend 
and  protect  the  women  and  children  who  were 
left  on  the  plantation,  the  slaves  would  have 
laid  down  their  lives. 

But  the  slaves  wanted  freedom.  I  have 
never  seen  one  who  did  not  want  to  be  free,  or 
one  who  would  return  to  slavery.  I  pity  from 
the  bottom  of  my  heart  any  nation  or  body 
of  people  that  is  so  unfortunate  as  to  get 
entangled  in  the  net  of  slavery. 

No  one  section  of  our  country  was  wholly 
responsible  for  its  introduction  and,  besides, 
it  was  recognized  and  protected  for  years  by 
the  General  Government.  Then,  when  we 
rid  ourselves  of  prejudice  and  race  feeling,  and 
look  facts  in  the  face,  we  see  that  the  ten 
million  negroes  of  this  country  who  them- 
selves or  whose  ancestors  went  through  slav- 


A  SLAVE  AMONG  SLAVES 181 

ery,  in  spite  of  it,  are  in  a  better  and  more 
hopeful  condition  than  the  black  people  in 
any  other  part  of  the  globe. 

Ever  since  I  have  been  old  enough  to  think 
for  myself,  I  have  thought,  in  spite  of  the 
cruel  wrongs  inflicted  upon  us,  the  black  man 
got  nearly  as  much  out  of  slavery  as  the  white 
man  did.  The  slave  system,  on  our  place, 
took  the  self  reliance  and  self  help  out  of  the 
white  people.  My  old  master  had  many  boys 
and  girls  but  not  one,  so  far  as  I  know,  ever 
learned  a  single  trade.  The  girls  were  not 
taught  to  cook,  sew  or  to  take  care  of  the 
house.  All  this  was  left  to  the  slaves.  The 
slaves,  of  course,  had  little  interest  in  the  life 
of  the  plantation,  and  they  were  too  ignorant 
to  do  things  in  the  most  improved  and 
thorough  way.  So  the  fences  were  out  of 
repair  and  the  gates  hung  half  off  their  hinges, 
doors  creaked,  window  panes  were  out,  plaster- 
ing fell  and  weeds  grew  in  the  yard.  There 
was  a  waste  of  food  and  other  materials,  too, 
that  was  sad. 

Finally  the  war  closed,  and  the  day  of 
freedom  approached.    It  would  be  a  moment- 


182 A  SLAVE  AMONG  SLAVES 

ous  day  to  all  upon  our  plantation.  We  had 
been  expecting  it.  Freedom  was  in  the  air, 
and  had  been  for  months.  As  the  great  day 
grew  nearer,  there  was  more  singing  in  the 
slave  quarters  than  usual.  It  was  bolder, 
had  more  ring  in  it,  and  lasted  far  into  the 
night.  Most  of  the  verses  of  the  plantation 
songs  had  some  reference  to  freedom.  True, 
they  had  sung  these  same  verses  before,  but 
they  had  felt  that  the  freedom  in  these  songs 
referred  to  the  next  world  and  not  to  the 
freedom  of  the  body  here.  The  night  before 
the  eventful  day,  word  was  sent  to  the  slave 
quarters  to  the  effect  that  something  unusual 
was  going  to  take  place  in  the  ''big  house'' 
the  next  morning.  There  was  little,  if  any, 
sleep  that  night.  All  was  excitement  and 
expectancy. 

Early  the  next  morning  word  was  sent  to  all 
the  slaves,  young  and  old,  to  gather  at  the 
house.  In  company  with  my  mother,  brother, 
and  sister,  and  a  large  company  of  other  slaves 
I  went  to  our  master's  house.  All  of  our 
master's  family  were  either  standing  or  seated 
on  the  veranda  of  the  house,   where  they 


A  SLAVE  AMONG  SLAVES 183 

could  see  what  was  to  take  place  and  hear 
what  was  said.  There  was  a  feeling  of  deep 
interest,  or  perhaps  sadness,  on  their  faces 
but  not  bitterness.  They  did  not  seem  to  be 
sad  because  of  the  loss  of  property,  but  rather 
at  parting  with  those  who  they  had  reared 
and  who  were  in  many  ways  very  close  to 
them. 

The  most  distinct  thing  that  I  now  recall 
in  connection  with  the  scene  was  the  presence 
of  a  United  States  officer  who  made  a  short 
speech  and  then  read  a  rather  long  paper — 
the  Emancipation  Proclamation,  I  think. 
After  the  reading  we  were  told  that  we  were 
free,  and  could  go  when  and  where  we  pleased. 
My  mother,  who  was  standing  by  my  side, 
leaned  over  and  kissed  her  children  while 
tears  of  joy  ran  down  her  cheeks.  She  ex- 
plained to  us  what  it  all  meant,  that  this  was 
the  day  for  which  she  had  been  so  long  pray- 
ing, but  fearing  that  she  would  never  live  to 
see. 

For  some  moments  there  was  great  rejoicing 
and  thanksgiving,  but  there  was  no  feehng  of 
bitterness.    The  wild  joy  of  the  emancipated 


184  A  SLAVE  AMONG  SLAVES 

colored  people  lasted  for  only  a  brief  period 
and  I  noticed  that  by  the  time  they  returned 
to  their  cabins  there  was  a  change  of  feeling. 
The  great  responsibility  of  being  free,  of  hav- 
ing charge  of  themselves,  of  having  to  think 
and  plan  for  themselves  and  their  children 
took  possession  of  them.  It  was  very  much 
like  turning  a  boy  of  ten  or  twelve  years  out 
into  the  world  to  provide  for  himself.  In  a 
few  hours  the  great  question  with  which  the 
Anglo-Saxon  race  had  been  grappling  for 
centuries  had  been  thrown  upon  these  people 
to  solve — how  to  get  a  home,  a  living,  how  to 
rear  their  children,  how  to  provide  schools, 
establish  citizenship  and  support  churches. 

To  some  it  seemed  that,  now  they  were  in 
actual  possession  of  it,  freedom  was  a  more 
serious  thing  than  they  had  expected  to  find 
it. 

Some  of  the  slaves  were  seventy  or  eighty 
years  old;  their  best  days  were  gone.  They 
had  no  strength  with  which  to  earn  a  living 
in  a  strange  place  and  among  a  strange  people, 
even  if  they  had  been  sure  where  to  find  a 
new  place  of  abode.     Besides,  deep  down  in 


A  SLAVE  AMONG  SLAVES 185 

their  hearts  there  was  a  strange  and  peculiar 
attachment  to  ^^old  Missus,"  and  to  their 
children  v^hich  they  found  it  hard  to  think 
of  breaking  off.  With  these  they  had  spent  in 
some  cases  nearly  half  a  century,  and  it  was  no 
light  thing  to  think  of  parting. 

Gradually,  one  by  one,  stealthily  at  first, 
the  older  slaves  began  to  wander  from  the 
slave  quarters  back  to  the  ''big  house''  to 
have  a  whispered  conversation  with  their 
former  owners  about  the  future. 


ONE  FLAG  OR  TWO? 

Andy  sat  beside  his  drum  under  an  apple 
tree  in  a  Gettysburg  orchard. 

The  drum  was  almost  as  large  as  he  and  his 
head  nodded  over  it.  It  was  still  dark  and 
he  was  very  tired.  But  the  far  away  whistling 
of  bullets  that  came  to  him  once  in  awhile 
kept  him  awake.  He  was  wondering  too  what 
was  happening  back  home  in  Kentucky  and 
remembering  a  day  there  two  years  before. 
He  had  thrown  down  his  school  books  and 
enlisted  on  the  day  when  he  was  thirteen  years 
old.  Andy  was  a  drummer  boy  in  our  Civil 
War  in  which  brothers  were  fighting  brothers, 
and  there  were  two  flags,  one  for  the  North 
and  one  for  the  South. 

Kentucky  in  1861  when  Andy  had  enlisted 
could  remember  its  old  ways  of  wilderness 
and  blood.  There  were  still  log  cabins  along 
its  turnpikes  and  Andy  had  seen  two,  not  so 
very  far  apart,  that  made  the  state  notable. 


ONE  FLAG  OR  TWO? 187 

In  one  of  these  cabins  Abraham  Lincoln  had 
been  born  and  in  the  other  Jefferson  Davis. 
That  was  another  strange  thing  about  this 
war,  there  were  two  presidents,  Abraham 
Lincoln  at  Washington  and  Jefferson  Davis 
at  Richmond.  There  were  also  two  groups, 
now,  of  states,  a  northern  and  a  southern 
group. 

That  had  been  a  wonderful  morning  when 
Andy  had  first  strapped  his  drum  over  his 
shoulder  and  marched  along  beside  his  com- 
pany in  a  new  blue  uniform.  The  younger 
boys  who  ran  through  the  street  beside  the 
troops  wore  red,  white  and  blue  neckties, 
and  the  girls  followed  too,  helping  to  carry  the 
Stars  and  Stripes.  There  was  cheering  and 
hand  shaking  and  the  band  played  'When 
Johnny  Comes  Marching  Home",  as  the  troop 
train  rolled  out  of  the  station  with  Andy  on 
board.  A  good  many  other  boys  had  joined 
the  armies,  also,  from  southern  plantations 
and  from  the  manufacturing  towns  of  the 
north.  They  were  beating  drums  and  play- 
ing bugles  and  bearing  flags  and  carrying 
water  and  hardtack  to  the  soldiers  under  fire, 


188 ONE  FLAG  OR  TWO? 

and  making  their  way  through  the  Union 
and  the  Confederate  Hnes  with  messages  of 
information  and  warning.  They  were  doing 
something  else  too.  The  first  pink  Ught  of 
the  sunrise  came  down  through  the  leaves 
of  the  apple  tree  and  touched  Andy's  face 
with  a  brave  morning  courage  as  he  re- 
membered an  order  that  his  commanding 
officer  had  given  him: 

'^Drummer  boys,  during  a  battle,  are  to 
take  off  their  drums  and  help  carry  the 
wounded  from  the  field  on  stretchers.  This 
is  their  duty  in  a  time  of  engagement  and  is 
just  as  important  as  taking  a  hand  at  a  gun." 

Andy  struggled  to  his  feet,  trying  to  brush 
the  dust  of  yesterday's  march  from  his  blue 
shirt.  His  shoes  were  ragged  and  his  cap 
was  torn  where  a  bullet  had  ripped  through 
the  blue  cloth.  Two  years  of  soldiering  had 
almost  made  a  man  of  him;  his  long  trousers 
were  above  his  shoe  tops  now.  But  the  day 
and  night  tramping  in  every  kind  of  weather, 
and  living  in  a  leaky  tent  among  bayonet 
scabbards  and  tinware,  greasy  pork  and  dirty 
biscuits  had  taken  the  fun  out  of  the  adven- 


ONE  FLAG  OR  TWO?  189 

ture.  Andy  asked  himself  what  this  Civil 
War  was  all  about.  So  far,  for  him,  it  had 
been  a  backache  from  his  heavy  knapsack, 
and  the  sound  of  the  crying  of  wounded  men, 
and  a  long  red  trail  of  blood  wherever  the  two 
armies  met.  But  a  loud  "Forward''  rang 
through  the  orchard  and  the  boy  slipped  his 
drum  strap  over  his  shoulder.  There  was  no 
time  to  wonder.  He  must  go  on  with  his 
battalion. 

It  was  now  July  of  the  year  1863.  Regiment 
after  regiment  in  their  worn,  ragged  blue 
poured  over  the  hills  and  toward  the  little 
Pennsylvania  town  of  Gettysburg.  Andy  kept 
up  with  his  men,  beating  out  'The  Girl  I 
Left  Behind  Me,"  until  he  and  the  other 
drummer  boys  saw  little  white  puffs  of  smoke 
down  in  the  valley  just  ahead.  Then  came 
the  faint  boom  and  the  nearer  thunder  from 
the  cannon.  Still  the  drumming  kept  up 
bravely  and  the  army  of  the  North  advanced 
in  double  quick  time  toward  the  smoke  and 
the  mouths  of  the  cannon.  Dp  another  hill 
and  across  a  stream  on  a  pontoon  bridge, 
tearing  down  fences  and  trampling  gardens 


190 ONE  FLAG  OR  TWO? 

it  went,  as  Andy  followed  with  the  rest.  Then, 
in  a  bright  strip  of  meadow  land,  the  regi- 
ments halted  and  he  heard  the  quick,  sharp 
order: 

'^Unfurl  the  flag!  Load!  Fire!'^ 
In  an  instant  the  meadow  was  a  battle- 
ground. The  explosion  of  shells  and  the  sing- 
ing of  bullets  mingled  with  shouts  of  the 
soldiers  and  the  groans  of  the  dying.  The 
sunshine  was  obscured  by  the  smoke  from  the 
guns.  Andy  sat  down  on  his  drum  on  the 
edge  of  the  field  and  when  the  smoke  lifted 
a  little  he  could  see  the  men  running,  sighting, 
ramming  their  guns,  firing,  swabbing  out  the 
cannon  and  then  sending  more  shells  shrieking 
over  the  field  in  the  direction  of  those  that 
were  bursting  toward  them.  Quite  often  a 
shell  whizzed  past  the  drummer  boy,  or  dug 
up  the  earth  beside  him,  but  he  waited  there 
all  day  behind  the  line  without  moving  until 
he  saw,  as  the  smoke  lifted  again,  that  the 
ranks  were  thinning  fast  and  there  was  need 
of  him.  So  Andy  got  up  from  his  drum, 
motioned  to  another  boy  to  follow  him  and 


ONE  FLAG  OR  TWO?  191 

they  went  out  into  the  midst  of  the  fighting 
with  a  stretcher. 

Andy  led  the  way,  dodging  the  shell  fire 
as  best  he  could,  keeping  close  to  a  rail  fence, 
but  going  straight  toward  an  advancing  line 
of  gray  that  was  pouring  a  rain  of  lead  followed 
by  a  deadly  artillery  fire  into  the  regiments 
of  blue.  All  over  the  field  there  lay  men  dead 
and  dying.  The  two  boys  crouched  and 
crept  through  this  tempest  of  battle  until  they 
were  able  to  lift  a  wounded  soldier  onto  their 
stretcher,  stagger  away  with  him,  and  grope 
along  in  the  smoke  to  the  back  of  the  line 
where  they  could  lay  him  down  in  safety  on 
the  grass.  They  looked  at  him,  plainly  out- 
lined in  the  summer  sunshine.  A  thin  stream 
of  blood  trickling  from  his  chest  stained  his 
uniform.  They  saw  that  his  coat  was  not  blue. 
It  was  gray. 

Andy  spoke  first,  to  the  other  boy. 

^^Get  him  some  water  from  my  flask,"  he 
said  ^Vhile  I  bandage  his  arm."  To  himself 
he  exclaimed.  '^IVe  brought  in  a  Con- 
federate!" 

After  the  soldier  had  drunk  from  Andy's 


192 ONE  FLAG  OR  TWO? 

tin  cup  and  had  rested  a  minute  he  looked  up, 
amazed,  in  the  drummer  boy^s  face,  and  Andy 
looked  down  at  him.  Why,  there  was  only 
the  difference  of  a  few  years  in  their  ages. 

''Anything  I  can  do  for  you?''  Andy  asked. 

"I'd  like  to  go  home,"  the  Confederate 
boy  smiled  a  little  as  he  spoke,  ''home  to 
Dixie." 

"What's  it  like?"  Andy  asked. 

"The  best  place  in  the  world,"  the  boy  in 
gray  said,  half  talking  to  himself.  "I'd  like 
to  have  you  see  it — a  big  white  house  with 
pine  woods  all  round  it  and  pretty  nearly  a 
mile  of  cotton  fields,  and  roses  and  fruit  grow- 
ing in  the  garden.  We've  everything  we  want 
right  there  in  the  house  that  has  so  many 
rooms  you  could  hardly  count  them.  You 
ought  to  see  the  drawing  room  with  all  our  old 
family  pictures,  and  the  music  room  where 
we  have  concerts  and  charades,  and  the  store- 
room full  of  things  that  we  buy  for  the  planta- 
tion, tools  and  new  saddles  and  bridles, 
calico  dresses  and  overalls  and  shoes  for  the 
negroes  and  nails  and  screws  and  pocket 
knives,  whatever  we  need.     I'd  like  to  be 


ONE  FLAG  OR  TWO? 193 

there  tonight,"  the  boy  in  gray  stopped  for 
breath  and  then  went  on. 

"The  cotton  fields  are  as  white  as  snow  and 
you  never  saw  stars  hke  those  that  shine  over 
the  South.  The  Hghts  twinkle  out  from  the 
cabin  windows  and  the  banjoes  are  playing — 
at  least  they  were — "  the  soldier  raised  him- 
self a  little  as  he  spoke  bitterly,  "until  the 
North  interfered  with  our  way  of  living. 
We  raise  the  cotton  that  the  North  makes 
into  cloth,  and  we  need  our  slaves  to  work  in 
the  cotton  fields.  We  have  to  buy  our  tools 
and  our  food,  and  the  North  spends  the 
money  we  pay  it  in  building  the  factories  and 
railroads  and  docks  that  we  ought  to  have. 
i  That's  why  this  war  is  being  fought,  to  show 
that  the  South  has  rights  in  the  Government 
and  the  right  to  secede  from  the  Union  too 
and  live  the  way  it  began,  on  a  plantation.'' 

It  had  been  a  long  speech  for  the  wounded 
Southern  boy.  He  lay  down  on  the  grass  and 
then  pointed  to  something  back  of  Andy.  The 
drummer  boy  turned  and  saw  a  soldier  in  a 
blue  uniform  dragging  himself  along  over  the 
ground,  wounded  too,  like  his  brother  in  gray. 


194 ONE  FLAG  OR  TWO? 

Andy  tried  to  help  him  and  the  Northern 
soldier  dropped  down  at  last  not  so  far  from 
the  other.  In  a  minute,  though,  he  tried  to 
go  on  again. 

^^Hold  on.  You  can't  walk,  you  know,'' 
Andy  warned  him.  "You've  got  a  bullet  in 
your  back.    Where  were  you  trying  to  go?" 

''Home,  I  guess,"  the  soldier  in  blue  gasped, 
dropping  down  on  the  ground  but  trying,  too, 
to  smile.  ''Home  where  I  could  get  a  clean 
white  shirt,"  he  went  on,  "for  I  won't  be  any 
more  use  at  fighting.  We  make  shirts  in  our 
town  up  north  from  the  loom  to  the  sewing 
machine.  I'd  like  to  get  a  copy  of  The 
Tribune  or  that  book  of  Mr.  Longfellow's, 
Hiawatha,  that  everybody's  reading,  from 
our  town  library.  I'd  like  to  go  to  the  town 
meeting  and  tell  them  how  I  helped  the  North 
to  try  and  keep  the  Union  together,  and  I'd 
go  to  our  white  meeting  house  on  Sunday. 
I  wish  I  could  have  a  piece  of  my  mother's 
apple  pie — I  should  Uke  to  see  my  mother — " 
he  was  too  weak  to  say  anything  more. 

Andy  kneeled  down  on  the  grass  beside  the 
quivering  boy  in  blue  and  held  the  same  tin 


ONE  FLAG  OR  TWO?  195 

cup  of  water  to  his  lips  from  which  the  other 
soldier  had  drunk.  He  could  understand  now 
why  there  was  a  Civil  War.  The  North  and 
the  South,  like  two  children  who  had  grown 
up,  had,  each,  built  its  own  home  and  raised 
its  own,  new  family.  They  were  different, 
because  the  soil  on  which  they  had  been  born 
and  lived  was  different.  The  South  was  a 
place  of  springing  green  cotton  shoots  and 
roses  and  ease  and  sovereignty.  The  North 
was  a  place  of  rocks  and  clattering  machinery 
and  industry  and  intolerance.  There  was 
mutual  misunderstanding,  dislike,  and  con- 
tempt between  the  two.  Each  of  these  new 
families  wish  to  exclude  the  other  from  control 
in  the  federal  government.  It  was  a  war  to 
decide  if  one  of  these  branches  of  the  Union, 
the  South,  had  a  right  to  withdraw  its  family 
of  states  from  the  home  roof  that  the  Stars 
and  Stripes  had  spread  over  it. 

Taps!  Andy  heard  the  sound  of  the  bugle 
coming  back  faintly  from  the  battleground, 
for  the  day  was  over  and  with  sunset  had 
come  a  respite  in  the  bloodshed.  He  looked  at 
his  two  soldiers  resting  side  by  side  there  on 


196 ONE  FLAG  OR  TWO? 

the  grass  behind  the  lines.  They  were  half 
asleep  now,  so  he  went  over  to  a  spring,  filled 
his  water  flask  and  set  it  with  the  tin  cup 
between  them.  Then  he  shouldered  his 
knapsack  and  his  drum  and  went  through  the 
gathering  dusk  over  to  the  field  of  Gettysburg. 

It  was  no  longer  a  green  field,  but  a  field 
of  gray  and  blue;  gray,  the  color  of  the  sky 
just  before  the  dawning  of  a  beautiful  sunrise, 
and  blue,  the  sky  color  that  holds  the  most 
sunshine.  Forty  three  thousand  American 
men  killed,  wounded  or  missing!  The  field 
of  Gettysburg  was  red  with  the  blood  of  the 
North  and  the  South.  Andy  couldn't  bear 
to  look  at  it,  at  first.  Then  he  remembered 
something  that  his  grandfather  had  said  to 
comfort  him  when  he  had  been  quite  a  little 
fellow  and  afraid  that  an  adventure  in  the 
woods  he  had  been  looking  forward  to  was 
going  to  be  spoiled  by  a  storm: 

^  ^Evening  red  and  morning  gray — 

A  sure  sign  of  a  pleasant  day.''  Andy's 
grandfather  had  said. 

That  was  the  promise  of  the  battlefield  of 
Gettysburg  before  him  in  which  so  much  blue 


ONE  FLAG  OR  TWO?  197 

intermingled  with  the  gray,  as  if  for  hope,  and 
the  Stars  and  Stripes  still  waved  above  it. 
It  was  the  Fourth  of  July,  1863,  when  the 
long,  hard  road  of  our  Civil  War  began  to 
turn  toward  the  common  home  and  the  com- 
mon brotherhood  of  the  Union. 


UNCLE  REMUS  AT  THE  WHITE  HOUSE 

"And  what  happened  then?''  the  small  boy 
curled  up  in  old  Aunt  Betsy's  chimney  corner 
asked,  his  eyes  wide  with  wonder. 

"Brer  Rabbit  en  Brer  Tarrypin,  dey  went 
home  wid  de  gals."  Aunt  Betsy  finished  as 
she  took  down  her  jar  of  ginger  cookies  from 
a  shelf  in  the  corner  of  the  little  Georgia 
cabin  and  offered  Joel  a  handful.  Joel 
munched  the  cookies  happily  as  he  looked  out 
of  Aunt  Betsy's  door  and  across  the  fields  of 
snow  white  cotton.  He  felt  as  if  he  were  the 
most  contented  boy  in  all  Putnam  County, 
even  if  it  was  hard  grubbing  sometimes  in  the 
tiny  home  where  he  and  his  mother  lived. 

Aunt  Betsy  was  ready  to  welcome  him 
down  there  at  her  cabin  in  the  pine  grove 
and  tell  him  stories  and  make  him  sweet 
potato  biscuits  any  day.  She  welcomed  the 
other  village  boys  as  well  and  when  she  was 
busy  at  work  out  in  the  fields  there  was  Uncle 


UNCLE  REMUS  AT  THE  WHITE  HOUSE  199 

Ben,  the  old  negro  mail  rider,  to  entertain 
the  boys.  Uncle  Ben  rode  from  their  town 
of  Eatonton  to  Monticello,  but  he  sometimes 
had  time  to  stop  outside  of  the  Eatonton 
post  office  to  tell  Joel  a  new  adventure  of  Brer 
Bear  or  Brer  Wolf. 

JoeFs  imagination  was  full  of  the  stories  he 
so  loved  as  he  started  home  through  the  grove. 
The  rustling  of  the  grass  was  like  the  foot- 
steps of  little  Brer  Rabbit  and  OV  Molly  Hare, 
his  wife,  going  home  to  their  cabin  on  the  other 
side  of  the  brier  patch.  The  yellow  flowering 
jasmine  reminded  him  of  the  party  dresses  of 
Miss  Meadows  and  the  girls.  A  flash  of  rusty 
red  on  the  edge  of  the  hickory  woods  was  Brer 
Fox  loping  along,  all  ready  to  play  tricks  on 
some  one. 

Hospitality,  plenty,  and  friendship  with 
all,  even  with  these  humble  beasts  of  the  wild, 
were  the  qualities  that  characterized  the 
South  when  Joel  Chandler  Harris  was  a  boy 
of  twelve  in  the  Georgia  of  1861. 

He  had  reached  the  village  now.  How  he 
did  love  every  familiar  bit  of  its  green  and 
white  hominess.    Eatonton,  and  all  the  rest 


200  UNCLE  REMUS  AT  THE  WHITE  HOUSE 

of  the  cotton  belt  for  that  matter,  had  not 
changed  much  since  its  first  cotton  field  had 
been  planted  and  its  first  colonial  house  built, 
surrounded  by  the  cabins  of  the  slaves  and 
forming  a  plantation  in  the  seventies.  The 
plantation  was  a  peculiar  and  necessary  kind 
of  settlement  in  the  South.  It  sheltered  the 
owners,  the  workers,  the  business  of  house- 
ke'eping,  farming,  and  raising  and  shipping 
the  cotton  which  filled  the  huge  flat  barges 
that  took  their  slow  way  down  the  muddy, 
yellow  streams  of  the  Southern  states.  So 
the  Southern  town  and  Southern  manner  of 
living  had  grown,  from  the  very  necessities 
of  the  climate  and  products,  to  be  quite  dif- 
ferent from  those  of  the  North. 

Joel  had  never  been  North  and  he  did  not 
see  any  real  need  of  going.  Eatonton,  he 
thought,  as  he  walked  slowly  down  its  tree 
lined  streets  was  pleasant  enough  for  any  boy. 
It  was  a  peaceful  little  place  with  a  white 
court  house,  a  green  square  in  the  centre,  and 
beautiful  old  colonial  houses.  They  had 
stood  for  decades  behind  their  tall  green 
hedges  among  sweetly  odorous  cedars  and 


UNCLE  REMUS  AT  THE  WHITE  HOUSE  201 

oleanders,  their  doors  wide  open  to  their 
neighbors  and  to  this  little  red  haired  boy 
and  his  hard  working  and  loving  mother. 

He  reached  their  white  front  gate  at  last, 
stopped  and  listened.  Yes,  he  recognized 
that  sound;  a  blue  jay  was  cracking  the 
acorns  it  had  hidden  in  the  knot  holes  of  the 
wood  shed.  He  heard  the  pattering  foot- 
steps of  a  squirrel  as  it  ran  along  the  shingles 
of  their  shabby  little  frame  house.  One 
learned  those  outdoor  ways  in  the  South. 
After  Joel  had  finished  hoeing  the  potato 
patch  he  was  going  to  peep  at  the  partridge's 
nest  in  the  meadow  beyond  the  garden. 
There  was  going  to  be  a  chicken  pie  for  supper; 
he  could  smell  it  baking  in  the  brick  oven. 
What  a  happy  day  it  had  been,  and  Joel 
looked  forward  to  so  many  more! 

Suddenly,  though,  like  a  storm  th^t  blights 
the  cotton  crop,  the  plantations  of  the  South 
were  shocked  from  their  century  old  peace. 

Joel  Harris,  a  boy  in  his  teens,  felt  the 
storm  at  the  very  beginning.  He  heard  tales 
of  run-away  slaves  and  their  depredations, 
although    he    was    told    that    planters    who 


202  UNCLE  REMUS  AT  THE  WHITE  HOUSE 

treated  their  negroes  justly  had  nothing  to 
fear  from  them.  He  saw  boys  from  Putnam 
County,  only  slightly  older  than  he,  march 
away  from  the  town  green  in  the  gray  uniform 
of  the  Confederacy  for  the  battle  fields  of 
Virginia.  Very  few  of  these  young  soldiers 
ever  came  home  again.  Joel  wanted  to  do 
something  to  help  his  homeland  of  the  South, 
but  he  was  only  a  lad  and  growing  poorer 
every  day  as  the  pinch  of  the  war  came  to  be 
felt  in  Putnam  County.  Cotton  fields  were 
running  to  weeds.  The  old  houses  were  in 
need  of  repair.  Food  was  scarce.  The  ladies 
of  the  plantations  were  burying  their  silver 
in  their  gardens,  and  the  men  were  hiding 
the  horses  and  mules  in  the  swamps. 

Then,  in  the  fall  of  1864,  two  officers  in  the 
blue  uniform  of  the  Federal  army  clattered 
out  of  Atlanta  and  rode  up  through  middle 
Georgia  with  the  ominous  word  that  a  com- 
pany of  troops  under  the  leadership  of  General 
Sherman  would  follow  on  the  way  to  the  sea. 
Joel  Harris,  terrified,  but  eager  to  know  what 
the  news  meant,  tramped  over  neglected 
fields  until  he  found  a  place  near  Milledgeville 


UNCLE  REMUS  AT  THE  WHITE  HOUSE  203 

on  Sherman's  direct  line  of  inarch.  He 
climbed  a  fence  there  at  the  edge  of  the  road, 
and  waited. 

All  at  once,  Sherman's  army  appeared. 
A  long  blue  column  that  choked  the  road  and 
crowded  the  ditches  at  the  side  swung  along 
in  the  wake  of  the  couriers.  It  was  a  vast 
horde,  bringing  consternation  to  the  planta- 
tions. The  Twentieth  Army  Corps  under 
the  command  of  General  Slocum  came  down 
the  high  road  past  Joel,  grim  fighters,  over- 
coming all  resistance.  They  displayed  no 
flying  banners  or  any  of  the  gay  trappings 
of  war  such  as  Joel  had  read  of.  They  were 
just  a  body  of  tramping  soldiers,  tired  horses 
and  lumbering  wagons  that  ploughed  their 
way  through  the  deep  mud  of  the  clay  roads. 
They  brought  with  them  a  confused  array  of 
captured  mules,  cows,  food  supplies  and  am- 
munition. Their  rear  was  crowded  with 
fleeing  negroes.  Some  of  the  soldiers  laughed 
at  the  boy  on  the  fence  as  they  passed. 

When  the  last  mule  and  the  last  slave  had 
passed,  Joel  got  down  and  went  home.  He 
felt   dazed   at  first,  for  everything  was   so 


204  UNCLE  REMUS  AT  THE  WHITE  HOUSE 

strangely  deserted.  The  stock  was  gone,  the 
cabins  were  empty  and  the  hearths  were  cold. 
The  town  itself  was  still,  as  if  it  had  died  in 
its  sleep.  Had  this  life  struggle  between  the 
brothers  in  gray  and  the  brothers  in  blue 
killed  the  South,  Joel  wondered? 

Suddenly  he  heard  a  soft  breath  like  low 
laughter  in  the  pine  grove,  and  the  odor  of 
jasmine  came  to  him  like  a  dream.  Miss 
Meadows  and  the  girls,  who  made  up  the 
beautiful  nature  family  of  outdoors,  had  not 
followed  Sherman  to  the  sea.  They  waited 
in  every  old  garden  and  forest  haunt  to  com- 
fort Joel.  He  heard  an  odd  little  chuckle 
beneath  his  feet.  That  was  Brer  Rabbit  who 
had  just  made  his  escape  from  a  brier  patch 
again  to  show  Joel  that  the  humble  often  get 
the  best  of  a  bad  situation,  and  it  is  always 
a  good  plan  to  look  on  the  funny  side  of  ones 
troubles.  Beside  Joel,  in  the  road  torn  by  the 
Federal  troops.  Brer  Terrapin  crawled  slowly. 
He  raised  his  head  and  twisted  it  knowingly 
at  the  boy. 

''There  is  still  wisdom  left,'^  Brer  Terrapin 


UNCLE  REMUS  AT  THE  WHITE  HOUSE  205 

seemed  to  say,  "and  a  long  life  in  which  to 
practise  it." 

Joel  rubbed  his  eyes  to  see  if  he  was  dream- 
ing. Why,  the  old  plantations  were  still  alive, 
just  as  they  had  been  in  his  former  days. 
What  if  he  was  penniless,  and  with  no  pros- 
pects for  his  young  manhood?  There  was  a 
friend  waiting  for  him  in  one  of  those  empty 
cabins,  Uncle  Remus.  Joel  went  in  and  sat 
down  beside  Uncle  Remus,  himself  the  little 
boy  he  used  to  be.  Through  the  years  of 
reconstruction  that  followed  Joel  Chandler 
Harris  mustered  a  jolly  company  of  animals 
and  birds  and  outdoor  folk  who  went  out 
into  the  world  in  the  Uncle  Remus  stories, 
from  the  South  to  the  North  and  at  last 
reached  the  White  House. 

One  day  in  the  year  1907  when  the  Civil 
War  was  only  a  memory  and  Mr.  Harris  an 
elderly  man,  there  came  a  letter  to  him  at 
Snap-Bean  Farm,  his  beautiful  estate  in 
Georgia,  from  the  President  of  the  United 
States.  Mr.  Harris  had  been  telling  stories  of 
the  South  to  the  children  of  the  Union  for 
many  years.    Children  and  their  parents,  too. 


206  UNCLE  REMUS  AT  THE  WHITE  HOUSE 

had  read  and  loved  his  stories  in  the  Century 
Magazine,  in  the  Saturday  Evening  Post,  that 
Mr.  Benjamin  Frankhn  had  founded,  in  our 
Youtb^s  Companion  and  in  many  other  pubU- 
cations.  His  books  of  stories  with  the  funny 
pictures  that  you  know,  were  in  many  homes. 
They  were  in  the  White  Houfee  as  well,  for  the 
mother  of  the  family  of  children  there  read 
out  loud  to  them  almost  every  night  about 
Brer  Rabbit  and  Brer  Fox  and  the  rest. 

The  letter  to  Mr.  Harris  said  among  other 
things, 

'Won't  you  come  up  and  have  dinner  with 
us? 

Theodore  Roosevelt." 

Mr.  Harris  could  hardly  make  up  his  mind 
to  go.  He  had  never  traveled  much  and  he 
dreaded  leaving  his  boys  and  girls,  his  horses 
and  dogs  and  his  farm.  Most  of  all  he  dreaded 
such  an  important  visit.  But  at  last  he  was 
persuaded  to  accept  the  President's  invitation 
and  he  made  the  trip  from  Atlanta  to  Wash- 
ington. There  was  a  little  Roosevelt  boy 
waiting  to  greet  him  on  the  steps  of  the  White 
House;     he  had  been   allowed  to   stay  up 


UNCLE  REMUS  AT  THE  WHITE  HOUSE  207 

beyond  his  bedtime  just  for  this  and  Joel 
Chandler  Harris  felt  no  longer  like  a  stranger. 

There  was  an  ovation  for  him  the  next  day. 
He  stood  with  the  President  on  the  balcony 
of  the  White  House  and  looked  down  into  the 
eyes  of  a  great,  affectionate  populace.  There 
was  also  a  state  luncheon  for  him  at  the 
White  House  at  which  Thedore  Roosevelt 
said: 

'Presidents  may  come  and  presidents  may 
go,  but  Uncle  Remus  stays  put.  Georgia  has 
done  a  great  many  things  for  the  Union,  but 
has  never  done  more  than  when  she  gave  Joel 
Chandler  Harris  to  American  literature.'^ 

It  was  a  wonderful  visit,  and  Mr.  Harris 
wrote  home  about  the  White  House: 

"It  gave  me  a  feeling  as  if  I  had  been  there 
before,''  he  said.  "It's  a  kind  of  feehng  that 
you  can  have  in  your  own  house  if  you've 
lived  right;  but  if  anybody  had  told  me  that 
I'd  find  it  in  full  flower  in  the  White  House,  a 
house  that  ten  million  politicians  and  a  good 
part  of  the  public  have  tramped  through,  I 
never  would  have  believed  them. 

"It's  a  home;    it'll  come  over  you  like  a 


208  UNCLE  REMUS  AT  THE  WHITE  HOUSE 

sweet  dream  the  minute  you  get  in  the  door, 
and  you^ll  wonder  how  they  sweep  out  all 
the  polities  and  keep  the  place  sweet  and 
wholesome." 

All  sorts  and  kinds  of  forces  work  together 
to  build  a  great  nation.  If  you  should  go  to 
Atlanta,  Georgia,  some  day  you  might  have 
an  opportunity  to  read  these  words  engraved 
on  a  granite  rock  there  and  describing  Joel 
Chandler  Harris: 

^^I  seem  to  see  before  me  the  smiling  faces 
of  thousands  of  children — ^some  young  and 
fresh  and  some  bearing  the  friendly  marks 
of  age,  but  all  children  at  heart — and  not  an 
unfriendly  face  among  them.  And  while  I 
am  trying  hard  to  speak  the  right  word,  I  seem 
to  hear  a  voice  lifted  above  the  rest,  saying 
*You  have  made  some  of  us  happy.'  And  so  I 
feel  my  heart  fluttering  and  my  lips  trembling 
and  I  have  to  bow  silently,  and  hurry  away 
into  the  obscurity  that  fits  me  best.'' 

So  we  know  that  the  stories  of  Uncle 
Remus  had  and  still  have  a  place  in  the  mak- 
ing of  our  history.  They  bring  the  children 
of  the  South,  the  North,  the  East  and  the 


UNCLE  REMUS  AT  THE  WHITE  HOUSE  209 

West  together  in  happiness  without  a  single 
unfriendly  face.  They  make  us  believe  in 
beauty,  in  the  wisdom  of  the  humble,  in  the 
good  in  everything  and  in  the  realness  of 
things  that  we  cannot  touch  or  see. 


UNCLE  SAM'S  BIRTHDAY  PARTY 

The  year,  1876,  when  Uncle  Sam  was  one 
hundred  years  old,  seemed  a  very  suitable 
time  for  him  to  give  a  birthday  party.  It  was 
just  a  century  since  the  declaration  of  indepen- 
dence had  been  signed,  a  most  eventful 
century,  too,  for  it  had  seen  the  beginning 
of  the  United  States,  the  great  national 
struggle  of  the  Civil  War  and  the  gradual 
rebuilding  of  the  Union  as  time  and  industry 
and  good  feeling  brought  the  people  together 
again. 

There  was  another  reason,  also,  for  giving 
this  anniversary  party.  Uncle  Sam  had  a 
beautiful  young  daughter  whom  he  desired 
to  introduce  to  the  society  of  the  nations. 
Her  cheeks  were  the  color  of  the  roses  of  the 
South  and  her  hair  was  as  golden  as  the  waving 
fields  of  grain  in  the  West.  She  had  the 
sturdy  independence  of  her  Pilgrim  ancestors 
and  the  grace  of  the  cavaliers  of  Virginia. 


UNCLE  SAM'S  BIRTHDAY  PARTY 211 

Her  coronet  was  encircled  with  the  stars  of 
the  Union,  her  dress  was  our  flag  and  she 
always  carried  the  torch  of  liberty,  for  her 
name  was  Columbia.  Uncle  Sam  was  justly 
proud  of  his  daughter  and  he  believed  that 
the  Old  World  would  be  as  well  if  only  it 
might  see  and  become  acquainted  with 
Columbia.  ^ 

That  was  why  he  gave  our  Centennial 
exhibition  at  Philadelphia,  the  first  capital 
of  the  federal  republic,  in  the  year  1876. 

It  was  possible  for  the  Congress  to  spend 
quite  a  sum  of  money  in  preparing  for  this 
coming-out  party  of  Columbia's  and  four 
million  dollars  was  appropriated.  Stately 
buildings  were  erected  on  Philadelphia's  green 
land  in  Fairmount  Park  for  welcoming  the 
guests  and  for  holding  the  birthday  gifts 
which  Uncle  Sam  surmised  would  be  offered 
on  this  eventful  occasion.  These  buildings 
with  the  roads  and  pleasure  grounds  and 
flower  gardens  that  surrounded  them  covered 
almost  a  hundred  acres,  and  the  entire  space 
was  so  gay  with  our  Stars  and  Stripes  and  the 
flags  of  other  nations  which  were  used  in  the 


212 UNCLE  SAM'S  BIRTHDAY  PARTY 

decorative  plan  that  the  whole  was  a  place  of 
color  such  as  history  had  almost  never  seen. 

Varied  kinds  of  preparation  were  begun  for 
this  Centennial  party  as  soon  as  Uncle  Sam 
issued  his  invitations.  Queen  Victoria  of 
England  made  some  etchings  to  send  as  her 
offering  to  Columbia,  and  our  beloved  poet, 
John  Greenleaf  Whittier,  wrote  his  Centennial 
hymn.  Mr.  Sydney  Lanier  of  Georgia  com- 
posed a  cantata  for  the  school  children  of 
Philadelphia  to  sing.  China  began  packing 
chests  of  fragrant  tea,  and  the  old  German 
workmen  of  the  Black  Forest  made  cuckoo 
clocks  to  send  to  America.  The  drivers  of  the 
rattUng  little  horse  cars  that  went  through 
the  streets  of  Philadelphia  had  new  blue 
uniforms  and  put  red,  white  and  blue  rosettes 
on  the  harness  of  their  horses.  Old  Mr.  Wise 
and  his  niece  and  his  little  grandson,  John, 
brought  their  balloons  to  the  Centennial 
Exhibition.^ Ballooning  was  a  new  and  danger- 
ous as  well  as  a  thrilling  sport,  and  the  Wise 
family  was  in  great  demand  at  circuses  and 
other  outdoor  entertainments.  A  new  rail- 
road route  from  New  York  to  Philadelphia 


UNCLE  SAM'S  BIRTHDAY  PARTY 213 

and  one  from  Buffalo  were  completed.  Ameri- 
cans had  not  travelled  very  much  or  very  far 
up  to  this  time,  but  here  was  a  great  op- 
portunity for  them  to  meet. 

As  the  gates  of  the  Centennial  exhibition 
opened,  Uncle  Sam,  mingling  with  the  vast 
crowd  that  thronged  the  grounds,  knew  that 
his  party  was  a  success. 

It  was  a  crowd  that  looked  like  the  colored 
pictures  in  that  pile  of  Godey's  Ladies'  Books 
that  you  like  to  look  over  up  in  your  great 
grandmother's  attic.  The  ladies  wore  very 
full  skirts,  their  polonaises  caught  up  with 
little  bunches  of  flowers,  and  a  great  deal  of 
fringe  hung  down  from  their  close  fitting 
basques  and  bright  shawls.  The  little  girls 
had  on  striped  stockings  and  high  kid  boots 
with  tassels,  and  the  boys'  neckties  were  much 
larger  and  of  brighter  colors  than  any  boy  of 
today  would  select.  They  were  tied  in  bows, 
and  large  bows  too,  underneath  their  round 
collars.  The  men  had  tortoise  shell  watch 
chains  made  with  large  links,  and  they  wore 
very  tall  beaver  hats.  Here  and  there  in  the 
mass  of  people  a  Manchu  cloak,  a  Cossack 


214  UNCLE  SAM'S  BIRTHDAY  PARTY 

uniform,  a  suit  of  English  tweed,  or  the 
bright  bonnet  of  a  French  woman  was  to  be 
seen,  for  almost  all  Europe  had  come  to  our 
Centennial. 

The  most  amazing  part  of  it,  though,  was 
Columbia's  gifts.  The  original  buildings 
were  not  adequate  for  holding  them  all  and 
some  of  the  foreign  nations  had  to  erect  their 
own  for  the  carvings  of  India,  France's 
jewelry,  embroideries  from  Egypt,  the  new 
Swiss  watches,  Africa's  ivories  and  skins, 
Hawaiian  sh'ells  and  corals,  Bohemian  glass- 
ware, Italian  mosaic  and  the  hundreds  of  other 
exhibits  brought  from  the  Old  World. 

Wonderful  as  these  examples  of  hand 
skill  were,  however,  they  were  equalled  and 
excelled  by  the  gifts  to  civilization  that  our 
own  United  States  showed. 

We  exhibited  the  use  of  exploding  gun- 
powder in  excavating,  driving  piles  and  min- 
ing, a  monster  engine  of  fourteen  hundred 
horse  power  that  could  move  all  the  machinery 
in  the  Centennial  Exposition;  pneumatic 
tubes  for  transporting  small  parcels  which 
were  going  to  be  used  later  for  carrying  cash 


UNCLE  SAM'S  BIRTHDAY  PARTY  215 

receivers  in  our  department  stores;  even  such 
novelties  and  wonders  as  typewriters  and 
airbrakes  for  railroad  trains  were  demon- 
strated. Those  everyday  objects,  of  which 
we  scarcely  think  but  always  need,  were  new 
then  and  were  looked  upon  with  wonder 
and  something  of  awe  by  the  Centennial 
visitors.  The  people  were  able  to  see  the 
manufacture  of  bricks,  boots  and  shoes, 
newspapers,  pins,  nails,  candy,  tacks,  shingles, 
corks,  dress  goods  and  envelopes.  The  patent 
office  showed  five  thousand  models  of  useful 
things  that  Americans  had  invented. 

Looking  quietly  into  one  room  of  the 
Educational  building  Uncle  Sam  saw  his  first 
kindergarten.  In  another  room,  boys  and 
girls  were  learning  to  use  tools  in  carpentry 
and  other  manual  training.  Still  another 
room  showed  how  beautiful  and  homelike  a 
school  can  be  made  through  the  use  of  good 
pictures  and  growing  plants.  All  these  sug- 
gestions to  teachers  were  going  to  help  in 
making  the  American  school  system,  later, 
the  best  in  the  world. 

One  of  the  most  interesting    exhibits    was 


216 UNCLE  SAM'S  BIRTHDAY  PARTY 

that  which  showed  our  contribution  to  the 
world's  pantry.  The  Western  States  sent 
fruits  and  food  grains  of  all  kinds.  The  South- 
ern states  showed  the  use  of  the  incubator  in 
raising  chickens.  New  England  offered  farm- 
ing implements  and  machinery  from  its  busy 
factories  that  were  vastly  better  than  any  in 
use  in  Europe.  Several  model  bake  shops  were 
going,  turning  out  hot  loaves  and  rolls  by  the 
minute.  The  visitors  from  Europe  discovered 
the  value  of  our  Indian  corn,  and  even  Asia 
began  bujdng  it  of  Uncle  Sam  after  the 
Exposition.  They  wanted  our  dried  fruits, 
as  well,  and  dressed  beef  that  we  were  able 
soon  to  ship  by  the  refrigerating  method  in 
steamships.  Uncle  Sam  changed  from  an 
importer  to  an  exporter  after  the  Centennial. 
He  had  more  to  sell  than  he  had  need  of  buy- 
ing. 

No  one  wanted  this  great  birthday  party 
of  a  new  nation  to  come  to  an  end.  The  only 
reason  for  its  stopping  was  that  every  one 
needed  and  wanted  to  get  back  to  work.  The 
farmer  from  Illinois  had  seen  a  Massachusetts 
plough  that  he  was  anxious  to  try  out.    A 


UNCLE  SAM'S  BIRTHDAY  PARTY  217 

Connecticut  miller  had  decided  to  move  out 
West,  nearer  the  wheat  fields.  A  Southern 
lady  had  decided  to  spend  a  winter  North  and 
offer  the  warmth  of  her  CaroHna  hospitality 
and  the  sweetness  of  her  cakes  to  her  New 
York  friends.  And  several  Northern  men  had 
made  up  their  minds  that  they  would  like  to 
try  raising  cotton  and  oranges  in  the  South. 

The  last  day  of  the  Centennial  Exhibition 
found  Uncle  Sam  sitting  in  the  ofiice  building 
in  the  grounds  going  over  his  accounts.  He 
was  counting  admission  tickets  and  could 
scarcely  believe  the  results.  It  was  probable, 
of  course,  that  a  great  number  of  the  nation^s 
own  people  and  its  foreign  guests  had  come 
through  the  gates  several  times,  but  there 
were  about  nine  million  admissions.  How 
we  were  growing! 

Then  Uncle  Sam  checked  up  the  foreign 
countries  who  had  travelled  with  their  offer- 
ings to  this  coming  out  party  for  Columbia, 
and  the  result  was  quite  as  surprising.  Thirty- 
three  nations  had  come!  And  the  States, 
Columbia's  own  family  of  brothers  and  sisters 
who    had    forgotten    former    quarrels    and 


218 UNCLE  SAM'S  BIRTHDAY  PARTY 

journeyed  in  seven  league  boots  to  do  her 
honor.  There  had  been  only  thirteen  states 
for  a  long  time,  but  twenty-six  were  repre- 
sented at  the  Centennial. 

Outside,  our  new  fireworks  were  being  sent 
up  over  the  grounds.  Colored  fire  and  huge 
rockets  that  made  a  design  as  they  shot  up 
into  midair  had  been  perfected,  and  one  could 
see  a  tree  of  liberty  and  a  great  star,  made  up 
of  smaller  stars  to  represent  the  Union, 
illuminated  over  the  old  City  of  Independence. 
There  was  hardly,  ever,  so  pleasant  or  so 
significant  a  birthday  party  as  this  one  had 
been.  It  had  not  only  introduced  us  to  the 
other  nations  as  a  self  supporting,  progres- 
sive, growing  people.  It  had,  amazingly, 
shown  ourselves  that  we  were  common  citizens 
of  a  common  country,  brought  closely  to- 
gether in  one  united  family  by  our  common 
impulse  to  work  and  to  achieve. 


THE   SHIP   THE   GIANTS  LAUNCHED 

A  giant  in  American  history!  There  has 
been  none  in  any  history  since  the  days  of 
Gohath,  you  say.  Magic  and  the  black  arts! 
These,  too,  you  say  are  never  to  be  found 
between  the  covers  of  a  nation^s  history; 
their  only  place  is  on  the  illuminated  pages 
that  tell  of  the  Arabian  Nights.  Yet  two 
giants  grew  in  our  United  States  during  the 
years  that  followed  the  Civil  War.  They 
are  here  with  us  today,  and  the  wonders  they 
have  done  and  are  yet  to  work  make  a  story 
stranger  than  any  that  was  ever  written  in 
fairy  lore. 

One  of  these  giants  built  an  American  city. 
The  tall  chimneys  of  the  city^s  factories  were 
his  castle  towers,  and  to  the  factories  he 
brought  riches  which  our  earth  from  East  and 
West,  and  from  the  North  to  the  South  hid 
in  her  bosom  for  whoever  was  able  to  extract 
them.    There  was  iron  which  made  the  steel 


220 THE  SHIP  THE  GIANTS  LAUNCHED   

framework  of  the  city  and  coal  for  firing  the 
great  blasting  furnaces  that  turned  the  iron, 
like  black  magic,  into  steel.  The  giant 
brought  timber ,  copper,  the  precious  metals, 
rubber,  stone,  flour,  meats,  vegetables  and 
fruit  to  the  city  to  make  it  a  place  of  con- 
venience and  comfort  in  which  to  live.  He 
surrounded  the  factories  with  homes  and  sky- 
high  office  buildings  and  stores.  His  auto- 
mobiles rolled  over  stone  highways.  Electric 
cars  and  steel  bridges  and  steam  railroad 
systems  linked  the  city  with  other  American 
manufacturing  centres  and  with  the  fair,  open 
country. 

It  was  an  amazing  piece  of  construction 
and  in  accomplishing  it  the  giant  grew  more 
and  more  colossal.  His  panting  breath  rose 
in  smoke  out  of  the  factory  chimneys,  and  the 
red  hot  metal  that  poured  from  the  furnaces  of 
the  iron  factories  was  like  his  life  blood.  He 
had  such  an  impulse  to  grow  and  add  to  his 
possessions  that  his  garments  became  dingy 
with  the  fog  and  dirt  of  the  city,  and  he  could 
not  spare  time  to  cleanse  them  and  his  mighty 
voice  could  be  heard  in  the  factory  siren,  the 


THE  SHIP  THE  GIANTS  LAUNCHED  221 

roar  of  traffic  and  in  the  shriek  of  steamboats 
and  train  whistles. 

This  was  our  American  giant,  wealth. 

Then  the  second  giant  came  to  the  American 
city.  Like  the  other,  Wealth,  he  was  a  creature 
of  the  earth  and  came  from  the  mountains, 
the  forests  and  the  farm  lands.  His  skin  was 
the  color  of  all  the  races  of  the  earth,  white, 
black,  yellow,  and  brown;  and  his  clothing 
was  that  of  the  American,  the  Irish,  the 
ItaUan,  the  Pole,  the  Armenian,  the 
Hungarian,  the  Scotch,  the  Japanese,  the 
Chinese  and  all  other  men.  This  giant 
came  to  the  American  city  from  the  uttermost 
boundaries  of  the  United  States  and  from 
the  four  quarters  of  the  globe  as  well.  He 
was  so  hardy  that  he  could  stand  in  front  of  an 
open  furnace  door  and  ladle  out  melted  iron 
without  flinching,  and  he  was  so  huge  and  so 
heavy  that  he  wore  out  the  stone  pavements 
of  the  city  on  his  way  to  and  from  the  factory 
where  he  worked.  He,  too,  became  dirty, 
smirched  with  charcoal  and  metal  filings. 
And  he,  also,  grew  daily  more  of  a  colossus 


222  THE  SHIP  THE  GIANTS  LAUNCHED 

and  his  voice  could  be  heard  in  the  rumble  and 
din  of  the  city  day  and  night. 

The  American  city,  also,  grew  as  these  two 
giants  met  and  worked  together  in  it.  It  was 
so  big  that  it  towered  higher  in  the  centre 
and  began  spilling  over  the  edges.  New  and 
intricate  machinery  came.  The  city  was 
tunnelled  underneath  and  an  elevated  road 
was  built,  because  there  was  not  room  enough 
for  the  traffic  in  the  streets.  Wealth  hired 
Labor  to  run  the  cars  and  trains,  mend  the 
streets,  build,  tend  machinery,  bake,  weld 
rubber  and  make  its  gas  and  electricity.  So 
the  American  city  grew  bigger  and  more 
gigantic  and  was  a  wonder  to  the  other 
countries  of  the  world  who  knew  how  young 
it  was. 

No  one  knows  where  its  growth  would  have 
ended,  for  it  began  building  aeroplanes  that 
could  wing  their  way  up  above  the  clouds, 
but  the  two  giants  fell,  all  at  once,  at  odds  with 
each  other. 

This  was  quite  natural,  because  two  large 
bodies,  especially  two  giants,  are  not  able  to 
stand  together  in  the  same  place.     So  the 


THE  SHIP  THE  GIANTS  LAUNCHED  223 

Giant,  Wealth,  and  the  Giant,  Labor,  who 
each,  continued  to  grow  and  puff  himself  out 
in  a  most  stupendous  manner,  began  to 
separate.  Wealth  put  on  new  clothes  and 
sat  behind  a  desk  in  an  office,  and  occasionally 
he  spent  a  day  at  home,  planning  his  work 
and  telephoning  about  it.  But  it  was  still 
necessary  that  some  one  should  tend  the  oven 
door  in  the  iron  factory  and  carry  on  the  other 
work  of  the  city  that  had  to  be  done  with 
hands,  so  Labor  stayed  where  he  had  begun 
and  did  the  same  kinds  of  work  that  he  had 
taken  up  in  the  beginning. 

The  city  offered  the  same  parks,  the  same 
schools,  the  same  hospitals,  picture  galleries, 
libraries,  theatres,  music  and  friends  to  both 
the  giants  and  to  their  families,  but  when  the 
two  met  after  the  day's  work  Labor  was  in 
overalls  and  Wealth  had  on  a  diamond  scarf 
pin,  and  Labor  remembered  when  the  city 
began  and  Wealth  had  been  dirty.  What  it 
forgot  was  that  this  had  been  the  honest  dirt 
of  building  a  city  from  the  ground  up  to  the 
soot  that  poured  out  of  a  factory  chimney. 
What  it  failed  to  understand  was  that  Wealth 


224 THE  SHIP  THE  GIANTS  LAUNCHED       

was  using  a  large  share  of  his  gold  and  brains 
to  build  more  cities  and  longer  transit  lines 
and  to  string  telephone  and  telegraph  wires 
and  put  up  factories  with  brighter  sunshine 
and  better  machinery  for  Labor  to  work  in. 

^'I  want  more  money,"  the  giant,  Labor 
began  to  shout. 

^'Then  you  must  work  for  it,"  the  giant, 
Wealth,  urged. 

So  the  two  began  to  fight.  It  was  a  dif- 
ferent and  quite  as  disastrous  fighting  as  our 
Revolution  or  our  Civil  War,  because  it 
stopped  for  intervals  our  American  business 
of  manufacturing  and  building  and  running 
our  cities  and  our  transportation  lines;  and 
these  were  what  made  us  a  great  nation. 

Suddenly,  though,  in  the  year,  1917,  a 
great  cry  came  to  the  ears  of  our  two  Ameri- 
can giants  from  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic 
Ocean.  It  was  made  up  of  many  smaller 
voices,  the  crying  of  those  who  were  hungry, 
and  mothers  who  had  no  homes,  and  young 
soldiers  who  were  dying  on  a  battlefield  for 
freedom's  sake.  And  all  these  smaller  cries 
united  in  one  mighty  voice  that  no  free  nation 


THE  SHIP  THE  GIANTS  LAUNCHED  225 

could  fail  to  hear.  It  called  the  United  States 
to  go  back,  over  the  course  that  our  ship  of 
freedom,  the  Mayflower,  had  taken  three 
centuries  before,  to  the  help  of  the  Allied 
nations  who  were  fighting  for  the  ideals  of 
freedom  on  the  earth. 

"We  must  go  quickly  and  we  shall  need  a 
new  and  different  ship  for  the  voyage,  ^^  Wealth 
said,  and  began  to  build  a  shipyard.  Such  a 
shipyard  as  it  was;  none  but  a  giant  could 
have  erected  it! 

Marsh  land  on  the  sea  was  filled  in  and 
covered  in  a  few  months'  time  with  huge 
docks,  administration  buildings  and  others 
for  receiving  the  materials  for  the  ships  and 
coal  and  all  kinds  of  freight,  and  for  housing 
the  workmen.  There  were  great,  light  rooms 
built  where  the  working  drawings  of  a  ship 
could  be  made.  Factories  whose  furnaces 
sent  up  their  towers  of  fiery  smoke  every 
night  rose  out  of  the  marsh  like  magic.  Rail- 
roads stretched  their  steel  rails  to  reach  the 
new  shipyard,  and  telegraph  and  telephone 
wires  connected  it  with  the  important  Ameri- 
can  cities.      When    it    was     finished,   this 


226 THE  SHIP  THE  GIANTS  LAUNCHED 

American  shipyard  extended  for  miles  along 
the  Atlantic  coast  and  touched  other  new 
shipyards  and  spread  itself  over  an  island  not 
far  from  the  land.  It  was  a  splendid  begin- 
ning, but  a  ship  could  not  be  built  without 
Labor.  That  was  the  next  need,  for  thousands 
of  workmen,  and  for  steel  that  made  the 
sinews  and  grip  of  our  country. 

This  is  the  second  magic  of  the  story,  how 
the  ship  was  built,  for  it  was  done  not  only  by 
the  shipbuilders  but  by  many  other  workmen 
as  well  who  left  their  places  in  factories  and 
steel  mills  and  along  the  roads  to  have  a  hand 
in  this  colossal  American  undertaking. 

Our"men  poured  from  the  mines,  from  the 
foundries,  the  factories  and  the  steel  mills, 
each  one  with  his  tools  and  a  part  of  a  ship 
in  his  hands.  The  steel  mills  all  over  the 
country  had  been  turning  out  special  parts 
that  were  needed  for  our  great  structural 
enterprises,  for  building  skyscrapers,  bridges, 
under  and  over  ground  transportation  lines, 
power  plants  and  water  front  ports.  Now 
these  steel  units  were  brought  to  the  shipyard 
to  be  fitted  tv  gether  and  fastened,  rivet  hole 


THE  SHIP  THE  GIANTS  LAUNCHED 227 

meeting  rivet  hole,  in  the  most  wonderful  ship 
building  the  world  had  ever  known.  The  keel 
of  the  ship  was  one  of  the  huge  steel  girders  of 
a  great  railroad  bridge,  and  its  framework 
and  decks  were  made  like  the  steel  beams  and 
flooring  of  one  of  our  office  buildings.  The 
boilers  and  engines  were  built  and  brought 
from  long  distances  to  the  shipyard. 
Hundreds  of  thousands  of  steel  rivets  came  by 
carloads  for  fastening  the  dififerent  parts  to 
each  other.  The  ship  was  measured  and  joined 
by  steel,  a  single,  master  steel  tape  by  which  all 
other  measuring  tapes  and  forgings  of  the  far 
away  mills  were  gauged.  Moulders,  pattern 
makers,  machinists,  bridge  builders  and  men 
from  other  trades  who  had  never  worked  in  a 
shipyard  before  toiled  day  and  night  to  join 
and  unite  the  keel,  the  framework  and  the 
floors.  A  man  who  had  no  trade  but  wanted 
to  help  in  this  building  was  taught  by  labor 
experts  in  the  yard  the  work  of  a  shipfitter,  a 
riveter,  a  holder-on,  or  a  heater. 

Along  the  miles  of  our  new  shipyards  there 
arose  a  din  so  piercing  that  it  was  louder  than 
the  roaring  of  the  two  giants  had  been  in  the 


228 THE  SHIP  THE  GIANTS  LAUNCHED 

days  before.  It  was  the  sound  of  steel  ham- 
mering steel  as  everybody  worked  together  to 
drive  in  the  rivets  of  the  new  ship. 

Then  the  ship  was  completed  and  ready 
to  launch. 

''What  shall  we  call  her?''  the  giants  asked 
themselves.  And  together  they  discovered 
that  the  work  had  named  the  ship  while  it 
was  growing.  Our  new  ship  of  freedom  was 
the  American  Fabricated  Freighter.  She  was 
a  part  from  steam  to  stern  of  the  fabric  of  the 
American  nation,  an  iron  framework  of  capital 
and  labor  and  steel.  None  of  these,  alone, 
could  have  brought  the  materials  of  her 
fabric  to  the  yard,  assembled  her  parts  and 
driven  her  rivets  in  less  time  than  any  ship 
had  been  built  before.  Shoulder  to  shoulder 
the  two  giants  pushed  their  ship  off  the  slip 
and  she  took  to  the  sea,  flying  the  Stars  and 
Stripes  proudly  as  she  was  launched  on 
Decoration  Day,  1918. 

More  and  still  more  fabricated  ships 
followed  this  first  one.  The  cry  from  the 
battlefields  of  Europe  came  to  our  shores 
again : 


THE  SHIP  THE  GIANTS  LAUNCHED  229 

^^We  must  have  food  or  we  shall  starve. 
We  must  have  wood  to  rebuild  our  homes. 
We  need  coal,  because  our  miners  are  fighting 
with  the  colors.  Send  us  these  or  we  shall 
perish  and  the  war  for  freedom  will  be  lost." 

So  the  new  line  of  our  ships,  their  wide 
steel  supported  decks  loaded  with  wheat  and 
fuel  and  building  materials  and  courage  and 
hope  started  across  the  Atlantic  Ocean; 
and  the  two  American  giants.  Wealth  and 
Labor,  side  by  side,  watched  them  proudly 
from  our  docks  until  the  smoke  from  their 
funnels  was  lost  in  the  great  gray  trough  of 
the  sea. 


THE  TOWN  CALLED  AFTER  HIM 

**Tbe  town  of  Bismarck,  Pa.,  has  changed  its 
name  to  Quentin." 

Quentin,  young  Quentin  Roosevelt, 

Has  a  town  called  after  him! 
Some  way,  as  we  read  the  word 

It  makes  the  eyes  grow  dim. 

How  brave  they  were,  how  young  they  were! 

Our  boys  who  went  to  die! 
Children  who  played  in  field  and  street 

So  short  a  time  gone  by 

Now  reach  the  stature  of  the  stars! 

Ah,  none  of  us  can  say 
How  many  heavenly  places 

Are  named  for  such  as  they. 

But  romping  children  here,  through  years 

Secured  from  horrors  grim, 
Will  speak  the  name  of  Quentin 

In  the  town  called  after  him. 

Mary  Stewart  Cutting. 


THE  LAST  FIGHT 

"Hurry  there!      All  aboard — all  aboard!" 

The  American  Boy  in  khaki  hurried  down 
the  gang  plank  and  boarded  the  great  troop- 
ship as  he  heard  the  warning.  The  scene  of 
embarkation  at  the  Atlantic  port  was  so  thrill- 
ing that  he  had  stopped  as  long  as  he  could  to 
watch  it.  He  was  a  small-town  boy,  not  so 
long  through  High  School,  and  the  war  spirit 
and  the  war  bustle  of  the  city  on  the  Atlantic 
coast  to  which  his  troop  train  had  brought 
him  was  more  exciting  than  anything  he  had 
ever  seen  in  all  his  life  before. 

Mingled  with  cases  of  ammunition  and 
machinery,  carts,  and  horses,  and  mules,  all 
waiting  their  moment  for  embarkation,  the 
Boy  had  seen  a  pressing  throng  on  the  wharf 
made  up  of  all  the  Americans  he  had  ever  read 
of  in  his  school  history  or  known  and  made 
heroes  of  in  his  everyday  life. 

Painted  Feather,  an  Indian  boy  of  direct 


232  THE  LAST  FIGHT 


descent  from  a  Choctaw  chief  of  the  old 
Colonial  days,  stood  beside  a  cowboy  there 
on  the  dock;  their  ranches  lay  side  by  side  out 
in  Montana.  The  Boy  himself  had  touched 
shoulders  with  a  stalwart  colored  lad  wearing 
the  same  uniform  as  his.  And  there  had  been 
that  glorious  mob  of  other  Americans;  big 
league  ball  players  and  the  famous  men  of  the 
College  gridirons,  automobile  and  motorcycle 
racers,  the  men  who  dared  any  adventure 
in  making  the  movies,  fearless  railroad  engi- 
neers, truck  drivers  who  loved  danger,  the 
boys  who  held  in  their  hands  the  trust  of  our 
wealth  which  their  fathers  had  earned,  and 
the  boys  who  could  work  tractors  and  dig 
and  build  and  shape  machinery.  It  was  a 
pretty  fine  crowd  to  be  one  of,  the  Boy  thought, 
all  wearing  khaki  and  all  lined  up  under  the 
Stars  and  Stripes.  The  best  part  of  it  all, 
though,  he  decided,  as  the  gang  plank  was 
hauled  up,  was  to  be  steaming  off  for  Europe 
in  this  particular  kind  of  way. 

France  had  asked  them  all  to  come  and 
England  had  sent  this  troopship  from  her  big 
gray  fleet  to  bring  them.    It  was  the  beginning 


THE  LAST  FIGHT  233 


of  the  greatest  adventure  they  had  ever 
known. 

No,  that  wasn't  quite  the  way  he  wanted 
to  put  it,  the  American  boy  began  to  feel,  as 
his  home  shore  slipped  out  of  sight  and  there 
was  nothing  to  be  seen  but  sky  and  sea  and 
the  convoys  that  guarded  them  from  the 
night  and  day  hazard  of  foes  beneath  the 
water.  France  had  sent  for  him.  England 
had  come  for  him  with  her  ship.  It  was  his 
adventure,  the  American  boy  knew.  He 
could  hardly  wait  for  it  as  the  ship  throbbed  on 
her  long  way,  slowed,  and  then  made  her 
triumphant  docking  at  a  French  port. 

France,  as  the  Boy  had  read  of  it,  and 
looked  at  its  pictures,  was  a  kind  of  fairyland 
place  of  unfailing  plenty  and  pleasant  living 
and  peace.  As  the  troop  train  which  was 
to  carry  him  to  the  battle  front  started  and 
he  pushed  to  a  place  where  he  could  look  out 
of  a  window,  he  knew  exactly  what  he  was 
going  to  see.  There  would  be  little  thatched, 
green  villages  nestling  in  the  hollows  of  hills 
that  were  thick  with  sheep  and  fragrant  with 
orchards.    Every  French  village  would  have 


234  THE  LAST  FIGHT 


its  square  towered  church,  and  the  larger 
gray  towns  with  their  factories  and  smoking 
chimneys,  each  had  its  beautiful  cathedral 
whose  lace-like  towers  were  higher  than  the 
chimneys.  There  would  be  miles  of  neat 
little  farms  and  storied  castles  lying  securely 
in  their  old  parks  and  guarded  by  century  old 
trees.  Nearly  every  one  would  be  busy 
ploughing  and  planting  and  tending  quaint 
shops  and  keeping  their  cottages  thriftily  and 
making  precious  things  with  their  hands. 
Surely  no  enemy  force,  however  strong, 
would  hurt  such  a  life  as  that. 

But  the  American  Boy,  straining  his  eyes 
from  the  window  of  the  troop  train,  saw  noth- 
ing of  this.  He  saw  instead  empty,  shell  torn 
fields  and  broken  roads.  The  only  landmarks 
were  the  ruins  of  what  had  once  been  homes 
and  churches.  From  time  to  time  a  road 
would  be  filled  with  rickety  wagons  pulled 
by  slow  farm  horses,  and  spilling  over  with 
their  loads  of  furniture  and  household  utensils. 
Very  old  men  and  women  and  little  children 
walked  beside  these  and  they  all  had  their 
arms  full  of  the  things  they  held  most  dear, 


From  the  window  of  the  troop  train,  he  saw  ruins 
of  what  had  once  been  homes  and  churches. 


THE  LAST  FIGHT  235 


the  babies  who  couldn^t  walk,  their  tools  for 
gardening,  their  pet  rabbits  and  their  birds 
in  wicker  cages.  Some  of  these  refugees  were 
crying,  and  all  had  a  look  of  fear  and  horror 
and  despair  in  their  faces  that  was  new  to  the 
American  Boy.  Something  must  have  hurt 
them  almost  beyond  healing;  something 
that  was  their  right  had  been  taken  away 
from  them,  he  realized.  He  had  not  thought 
very  seriously  before  why  America  was  send- 
ing an  army  to  France.  He  had  been  so 
thrilled  at  the  thought  of  being  a  part  of  it, 
himself,  of  perhaps  meeting  the  German's 
flying  circus  in  the  air. 

Now  he  knew.  The  American  Expedi- 
tionary Force  had  come  to  help  take  that  look 
of  terror  out  of  the  faces  of  the  refugees  and 
to  see  to  it  that  no  free  born  American  ever 
experienced  the  same  horror.  It  was  more 
than  an  American  adventure.  It  was  a  fight 
to  preserve  the  freedom  that  had  begun  with 
the  landing  of  the  Pilgrims.  It  was  parti- 
cularly his  fight,  the  fight  of  the  American 
Boy  who  had  inherited  freedom  as  his  birth- 
right. 


236  THE  LAST  FIGHT 


The  Front,  too,  was  very  different  from 
what  he  had  imagined  it  would  be  Uke;  it 
was  so  colossal,  so  gigantic,  so  like  a  great  new 
business.  Wiring  telephone  lines,  rebuilding 
roads  and  bridges,  cooking,  nursing,  and 
burying  the  dead  was  going  on  as  if  for  a 
whole  state.  The  Boy  had  never  felt  so  alone 
in  his  life,  and  never  had  he  been  in  such  a 
crowd.  Every  highway  was  a  tangle  of 
loaded  ambulances,  gray  motor-trucks,  the 
officers'  cars,  endless  lines  of  artillery,  supply 
trucks,  field  kitchens  and  motor  cycles  that 
zig-zagged  their  course  through  the  smallest 
spaces  in  the  mass  of  traffic.  Marching 
toward  his  command,  the  Boy  was  dazed 
by  the  turmoil  he  found  himself  in;  the 
shouting  of  mule  drivers,  the  cracking  of 
whips,  the  popping  of  the  cycles,  and  the 
horns  of  the  motors  mingled,  and  there  was 
the  incessant  cannonade  of  the  guns  toward 
which  they  were  moving  that  grew  louder 
every  moment. 

The  Boy  was  glad  when  the  march  ended 
and  the  time  came  for  him  to  begin  his  work. 
Even  there,  at  the  front  of  the  Front,  it  was 


THE  LAST  FIGHT  237 


the  same,  an  organized  business  of  the 
advance.  Every  one  had  his  own  part  in  it, 
and  was  doing  it  vaHantly,  as  if  it  was  his 
war.  Painted  Feather  was  scouting.  A 
famous  American  baseball  player  had  shown 
that  he  could  throw  hand  grenades  under 
fire.  Some  of  the  movie  men  were  painting  a 
hospital  in  camouflage,  also  under  fire,  and  a 
football  hero  was  rushing  into  machine  gun 
nests  to  bring  back  the  wounded  of  his 
company. 

Everything  was  ready  for  the  Boy  the  day 
his  part  came.  His  aeroplane,  eager  for  the 
wind,  and  as  clumsy  on  the  field  as  a  sea  fowl 
unused  to  the  land,  was  oiled  and  already 
throbbing  with  the  mighty  whir  of  the  screw. 

"She^s  working  like  a  bird,'^  the  machinist 
said  as  the  Boy  climbed  in  between  the  planes. 

There  was  a  gasp,  like  a  cry  of  mingled  fear 
and  hope,  as  the  engine  and  the  aeroplane 
rose  from  the  field  and  began  climbing  as  up 
a  spiral  staircase,  farther  and  farther  away 
from  the  earth.  Everything  below  shrunk 
to  toy-size  as  the  Boy  glanced  down.  The 
soldiers  ran  to  and  fro  like  puppets,  the  red 


238  THE  LAST  FIGHT 


cross  on  the  hospital  roof  was  only  a  patch 
of  color,  and  then  a  gust  of  air  met  him  and 
shook  him  as  if  his  machine  had  been  a  straw. 
He  was  rising  in  enormous  leaps  and  making 
his  entry  into  the  land  of  the  clouds.  It  was 
colder,  although  it  had  been  summer  down 
below  on  the  earth.  The  Boy's  hands  felt 
like  stones  and  his  heart  thumped  in  time 
with  the  steady  drum  beat  of  the  engine. 
All  around  him  was  a  thick  white  curtain  of 
fleece,  impenetrable  to  the  eye,  but  the  planes 
guided  him  through  it  and  into  mazes  of  cloud, 
always  higher  and  farther  on.  Still  he  drove 
ahead  until  he  was  several  miles  within  the 
German  lines. 

He  wished  he  could  see  something. 
Strangely  enough  he  remembered  a  verse  that 
he  had  heard  once  in  church: 

"Let  thy  servant,  I  pray  thee,  turn  back 
again  that  I  may  die  in  mine  own  city!'' 

But  the  Boy  suddenly  heard  the  deafening 
burr  of  another  propeller  almost  upon  him. 
An  enemy  plane  nosed  its  way  through  a 
cloud  bank  and  was  upon  him  in  an  instant. 


THE  LAST  FIGHT  239 


Just  one  thought  flashed  through  the  mind 
of  the  boy. 

"We^re  both  like  birds.  I'm  the  eagle,  and 
that  German  plane  marked  with  black  is  a 
buzzard  like  those  that  fly  over  the  dead. — 
Here  goes  the  American  eagle!'' 

Then  he  dived,  rose,  touched  his  gun,  fired, 
and  watched  the  buzzard  drop,  its  trail 
marked  by  a  line  of  flame.  There  wasn't 
any  time  to  lose,  he  knew,  as  he  turned  his 
machine,  took  the  course  back  and  skimmed 
along  through  the  white  banks.  A  rain  of 
fire  pursued  him,  but  he  circled,  rose,  banked, 
dropped  and  escaped  it.  At  last  the  firing 
stopped  and  his  land  of  clouds  became  very 
still.  And  there,  in  front  of  him,  he  could 
see  the  white  spires  of  a  city. 

It  was  an  American  town,  just  like  his  home 
town.  There  were  the  same  elm  trees  almost 
touching  across  the  streets,  and  the  same 
comfortable  houses  with  service  flags  hang- 
ing in  the  windows.  Children  were  racing 
home  from  school,  the  factory  was  running 
and  the  stores  were  full  of  food.  Everybody 
seemed  just  as  usual,  busy  and  happy  and 


240  THE  LAST  FIGHT 


free.  The  only  thing  that  made  this  town 
in  the  clouds  different  from  his,  the  American 
Boy  saw,  was  the  crowd  of  strangers  on  the 
edge  of  it,  reaching  out  their  hands  toward 
its  homes  and  smiling  with  a  wonderful  kind 
of  joy.  Where  had  he  seen  those  people 
before,  the  Boy  wondered?  Then  he  remem- 
bered. He  had  seen  them  as  refugees  along 
the  broken  roads  of  France. 

Just  a  dream  picture,  of  course!  The  Boy 
dipped,  and  suddenly  saw  the  trenches  that 
made  the  foreground  of  his  section  of  the  line. 
He  dropped  safely,  but  as  he  looked  his 
aeroplane  over  he  thought  again  of  that  city 
in  the  clouds. 

It  was  more  than  an  American  town,  it  was 
a  world  city  now.  It  was  built  of  the  same 
logs  that  the  Colonists  had  hewed  and  made 
into  a  stockade  of  freedom.  That  was  why 
it  had  heard  the  call  of  a  people  in  captivity 
and  had  sent  its  sons  to  help  in  a  war  to  pre- 
serve the  world's  freedom. 

'^My  fight!''  the  American  Boy  said,  ^^and 
I  did  my  best  in  it." 


A  PROCLAMATION 

Everything  for  which  America  fought  has  been 
accomplished.  It  will  now  be  our  fortunate  duty  to 
assist  by  example,  by  sober,  friendly  counsel,  and  by 
material  aid  in  the  establishment  of  Just  democracy 
throughout  the  world. 

By  the  President  of  the  United  States, 

November  eleventh, 

nineteen  hundred  and  eighteen. 


CHRONOLOGY  OF  MAIN  EVENTS 
Referred  to  in  Broad  Stripes  and  Bright  Stars 


The  Landing  of  the  Pilgrims 1620 

Our  First  Peace  Table 1621 

Dutch  Purchase  of  Manhattan 1626 

England  Grants  a  Charter  to  the  Massachusetts 

Bay  Colony 1629 

The  Sailing  of  the  Puritans  with  John  Winthrop  1630 

The  Founding  of  Harvard  College 1638 

English  Occupation  of  New  York 1664 

The  Destruction  of  Jamestown 1676 

Benjamin   Franklin   Represents   the   American 

Colonies  before  the  English  Parliament    .  1766 

Daniel  Boone  Starts  the  Wilderness  Road  1769 

The  First  Permanent  Settlement  in  Kentucky    .  1775 

Washington  Takes  Command  of  the  Continental 

Army 1775 

The  Signing  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence  1776 

The  Battle  of  Trenton 1776 


CHRONOLOGY— Continued 

Adoption  by  the  Congress  of  the  Flag       .      .      .  1777 

CoRNWALLis  Surrenders  to  Washington      .     .     .  1781 

Treaty  of  Peace  Between  Great  Britain  and  the 

United  States  Signed  at  Versailles  ....  1783 

The  Inauguration  of  George  Washington,  the 

First  President  of  the  United  States     .      .      .  1789 

The  Appointment  of  Alexander  Hamilton  as  the 

First  Secretary  of  the  Treasury       ....  1789 

Establishment  of  the  First  National  Bank    .      .  1791 

Establishment  of  the  Mint 1792 

The  Trip  of  the  First  Steamboat  up  the  Hudson  1807 

Patenting  of  the  Reaper 1834 

Samuel  Morse   Perfects  his  Invention  of  the 

Telegraph 1844 

England  and  America  United  by  the  Atlantic 

Cable 1858 

The  Battle  of  Gettysburg           .     .     .  •   .     .  1863 

Sherman's  March  to  the  Sea        1864 

The  Centennial  Exposition 1876 

The  United  States  Enters  the  World  War     .     .  1917 

The  Launching  of  Our  Fabricated  Ship           .     .  1918 

A  Proclamation  by  the  President  of  the  United 

States 1918 


W  t  S1UI  fl  tT  TJ-r "  rw/TT  • 


■Yf-r 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

EDUCATION-PSYCHOLOGY 
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